


What It Will Take

by inadistantworld



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dark, Dark Vex'ahlia, Dark not Evil, F/M, I'm Bad At Tagging, Magical Vex, Original Character(s), Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Percy Stays About the Same Though, Power Couple, Wrong Thing Right Reasons
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-09-18
Updated: 2018-02-11
Packaged: 2018-12-31 04:20:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 32,384
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12124383
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inadistantworld/pseuds/inadistantworld
Summary: The day Vex'ahlia read Opash's journal she wasn't at her best. There had been so much, there had been too much happening, and she just wasn't at the top of her game. And when a voice wormed its way into her ear and told her that there were ways to beat Vecna, ways to save her friends, save the world, she didn't have the power to turn it down. No matter the cost.When she shuts the book Percy knows. He had jokingly said that if something happened and she became evil that he would still be with her, but he had meant it. No matter what he would stand by her. And at least next to her he could try and balance her out, keep her from going to far. She had done it so many times for him.TLDR: What might have happened if Vex failed a wisdom save and Vex and Percy took a darker turn.





	1. A Moment of Weakness

There was static in the air that night. Keyleth said there was a storm on the way but Vex felt that there was more than that. Her gut said it was about all those books in the library. She didn’t like the look of them, she didn’t like their origin, she didn’t like any of it. But that didn’t mean they shouldn’t look at them, it just meant she didn’t want to look at them.

Which was why when Percy asked who read Abyssal she was a little conflicted. On one hand she loved seeing the crease in his brow when he was frustrated and she wanted to show off a little, with how much Percy loved books she wanted to tease him a little about it while she read to him. On the other she did not want anything to do with those books. Especially _that_ one. The one in the corner with a lock on it.

And while she debated Vax sidled up to Percy, a wicked grin on his lips and a glint in his eyes. “Oh? Does Percival need help reading a book?”

Vex took the spot on Percy’s other side, “We know Abyssal,” she said teasingly.

“We learned it in school.” Vax plucked the book from Percy’s hand and Vex almost let out a sigh of relief.

It wasn’t as easy as Vax wanted it to be, it wasn’t written fully in code but it wasn’t totally understandable either. But he made his way through it, poking fun at Percy the entire time. And as much as Vex felt like she should pay attention she found it very hard to shake the feeling of an unwelcome presence too close to her. Like when her brother was making faces at her when he was invisible, only this was less fun.

She looked over at the book again. It was just _wrong_.

“Vex?” Her eyes snapped back to her brother. He held a thin black book out to her, “Take a look at this one for me.”

She took it from him and flipped through the pages, scanning it over slowly. “It’s in Abyssal but…none of it makes any sense. I think it’s a spellbook of some sort.”

Vax nodded, “Right. But we can’t use it, we don’t use magic and they don’t speak Abyssal. There’s a bunch of them here.” He held up a few more to show her.

Everyone else groaned. Even if the spells were terrible and should never be used they needed to know what they were. And now they would forever be a mystery. Who knew what Raishan was really doing down there.

There was a moment of uneasy stillness before Percy stood. “There’s only one more left.”

He went over and picked it up. Vex wanted to stop him but stayed silent. She stood and stepped backwards, slowly making her way to the door.

Keyleth cleared her throat and tried using a more leader like voice, “Pike should read it.” Everyone nodded their agreement. Of all of them Pike had the most willpower. Keyleth was probably second. Which everyone else made a mention of.

Percy stepped back to the door with her. Doty and Tary stayed in the room but far away from the book. Pike and Keyleth stood at the table with Vax.

“Vex,” her brother waved his hand for her to come forward.

“I think I’ll stay over here,” she said lightly, a smile finding its way to her face. She was an expert of the mask, this would be no different.

He rolled his eyes and when he looked away Percy’s hand slipped in hers. He gave it a gentle squeeze and when she looked at him he seemed so…strong. Percy didn’t have the willpower they all did, he’d made a deal with a demon in his sleep. And while his impulse decisions weren’t on the same level as Vax’s they didn’t leave her feeling very confident of his ability to pass whatever obstacle Gilmore was worried was in this book. Vex wanted him far away from this book. But she also wanted him by her side.

Vax’s fingers touched the black, heavy, metal lock. “Hey, Pike should read that!” She called out to him.

“I’m not going to fucking read it,” Vex liked to think that when he got nervous the feathers on his armor fluffed up and right now they looked particularly poofy. “I’m just gonna unlock it for Pike.”

“Alright.” She still watched him carefully though. He blessed himself, Pike, and Keyleth, murmuring to the Raven Queen as he did so, and then pulled out his lockpicks.

The tome was bound in black leather, it was weathered, a few scratches were gouged into the cover. It made Vex wonder if something had tried to get in long ago but couldn’t undo the lock.

The lock clicked and the latch opened. Everyone held their breath, waiting for something to happen, but nothing did.

Vax stepped back and Pike took his place in front of the book. She took out a quill and with the tip lifted the heavy cover an inch. Still nobody breathed. Still nothing happened.

In one quick movement she flipped it open. A few yellowed pages clung to the cover for a moment before curling back their place. A small cloud of dust escaped and settled. And Pike slowly leaned forward to look.

“I can’t read it,” she finally said. It was small but there was relief in her voice. Then again who wouldn’t be relieved?

Vax peered over her shoulder and caught the shape of the words. “It’s Abyssal.”

Which of course it was. An evil book that was likely to take over someone’s mind would be in Abyssal. Which meant once again it was only the twins who could read it.

Vax looked over to his sister who looked halfway between a groan and running out the room. “I’ll do it.” He touched Keyleth and Pike’s shoulders to get them to step away.

Vex, very loudly, huffed. “I have a much stronger will than you do.”

Vax laughed, “Well that’s quite subjective.” But he knew it too. And perhaps this wasn’t the time to take chances.

“I’ll read it.” She stepped forward, back into the room, and a wave of nausea turned her stomach. She pressed forward to the book. Pike touched her arm as she passed by and murmured something under her breath. Vex caught the word Sarenrae. A blessing.

She stood in front of the book, her hands in tight fists at her side. She hated this. She hated learning Abyssal in school and she hated having to read this book now, but she knew she stood a better chance than her brother.

Percy rushed over and grabbed her cheeks, turning her to look at him before kissing her. His lips pressed against hers hard in such a familiar way. When he pulled away, far too quick for her tastes, he had a smirk, “If you turn evil, it’s still cool. Just so you know.”

And as silly as it was, it helped.

They laughed a little and Vex noticed everyone had taken small, unconscious steps away. But Percy stood at her side, refusing to budge.

She took a deep, slow breath, and looked at the page before her.

There were words on the page, it was a book of course there were words on the page, but they also seemed to form on their own, swirling around her, in front of her, wavering off the page. It was like they wanted to be read by someone like her. She shook the thought and pressed forward, flipping through the pages.

It was a personal journal. Written by Opash.

It began with his history in Marquet during the Age of Arcanum. It detailed his experiments that he had been working on. The rending and capturing of the soul. Those words only made the uneasiness in her gut worse. He had captured servants and desert wanderers and would keep these individuals in his caverns that littered Marquet for him to use. He trapped them in gems and glass menageries and would come back when the time suited him to corrupt souls, shatter them, destroy them completely, forge them into different items, and even feed on them.

He had been fascinated with the “never-ending essence of existence” and had been trying to figure out how to manipulate it and control it on his own. Of course with ideas like that what happened next was understandable.

He began to write about how people didn’t understand his work, how he had been driven out of his home, the trials that were put against him, and how he had been banished to the island. He did not call the island by its name, perhaps it had no name before him, it was simply “the island”.

He started researching the island. He had tried to leave through magical means and was only met with disaster, ending far out at sea once and bloodied many times, other times he simply remained in the place he had tried to use his magic in. He came to the conclusion that there was something about the metal on the island, something very ancient that became like a black hole of arcane projection. It made Astral Projection from the island impossible.

Vex had a flash of a memory. It was out at sea and a shape in the water. Kima and Allura, searching for a way back to land. She was familiar with the problem in that magic. The image shifted and there was a single dark shape. As she looked on curiously the body shifted and a sickly, pale face with a scraggly, wet beard turned to look at her. She swore those cold gray eyes were looking straight at her before the image was swept away with the next page.

When he had been banished he hadn’t been banished to an uninhabited island and there were islands nearby that had established trade between each other. He had convinced them to come and work for him. He brought the entire civilization to live on his island under him. And then he reaved every last one. They became his experiments to continue his work from Marquet here on the island.

Another memory filled Vex’s mind. Or no, not a memory. A vision. Or perhaps her imagination.

It was people. Thousands of bodies filling the chasm. Another soul sucked from another body, thrown in the pit by one of their friends with hollow eyes. They turned, grabbed another body, and threw it in.

It flashed again and she was in the cavern on her broom and the dead were flying past her, reaching out, trying to claw at her. It was them. She knew it. They were his victims.

Each page of this horrific experiments made her want to throw up, but still she read on.

A later chapter mentioned finding a near-dead dragon that washed on shore. A red dragon on the cusp of death. Thordak. “What a great gift this is, to toy with the soul of an ancient entity like this.” he had written. He had thanked names Vex had never heard, gods long forgotten. They made her shiver. Perhaps these names were meant to be locked away.

The journal spoke of years and years of enslavement of this red dragon and torturing it and extracting information and manipulating it, making the beast his own toy. For a moment Vex forgot that he had killed her mother, that he had destroyed and enslaved Emon, that he had almost killed everything, that he had killed Scanlan. For a moment she felt pity. And when she remembered it all again she felt a small amount of justice. He deserved it. She did not think about how Opash had kept him alive, how Opash had twisted him further, had driven him even more mad. It did not register that Opash made Thordak into what he became, only that what he became deserved this.

Opash then began to pull together research he had read elsewhere on the “continuation of a dragon’s soul”. It had been about taking a dragon’s spirit and making it indestructible, able to live from body to body. He was convinced if he could find a way to modify the magic he could make it work for himself and he wouldn’t be forced into the binds of lichdom, that he could avoid the phylactery entirely. Through a dragon transition his power and soul would be easier to maintain.

There had been a ritual, one that took place long before even Opash that involved an ancient dragon more powerful than even the Thordak Vex knew. A dragon named Guuthal the Ever-Fed.

Her mind filled with a new image. A black dragon of immense size. She could feel the all too uncomfortably familiar wave of necromantic energy flowing in waves off him, even in the vision state. He opened his mouth and out from it poured the loudest roar she’d ever heard and large, heavy wings stretched out. He flapped them and a powerful wave of air pushed her hair back and stung her eyes. She wanted to hold her hand up to block some of it but could not move. The dragon roared again and powerful limbs tensed before it launched itself into the air with another flap of its wings.

The vision faded as she read on. Guuthal had used ritualistic aid, forbidden rites, and sacrifice of its own lifeforce to be born again as a never-dying new form of unlife referred to as a dracolich.

A shiver passed through her body. She didn’t need to know everything about liches to know a dracolich was something she never wanted to see. She began to wonder how terrible something must be for it to be forbidden even to dragons like that.

As she read on she could see how close he was getting in his research. Her eyes flicked through the pages even faster.

And then his handwriting disappeared, replaced with something less elegant and a pen that dug into the pages harder. It switched from Abyssal which flowed seamlessly around her to Draconic that was stagnant on the page.

And it was in that moment that she felt a cold presence curl along her shoulders and into the back of her neck. And just before she starts to read the Draconic entry something reached for the back of her mind. Cold fingers. Ten. Twenty. And endless supply of grasping fingers reaching for the back of her mind.

“Enough!” A cold, slick voice surrounded her. She felt the need to wipe away at her ears, like she would find something thick and wet there. “Leave,” it hissed to the fingers and they withdrew slowly. “My apologies,” the voice was sickening. It came from immediately to her left. Percy was still on her right, she could feel his warmth but couldn’t turn to look at him.

“Who are you?” The words didn’t come from her mouth and yet they filled the air and still nobody turned to look at her. The world around her seemed unnaturally still. And before he answered she knew.

“I am the author of the journal you have stolen.” The words crawled through her, the feeling made her want to retch. “What do you see in it? What am I?”

“Disgusting,” she snapped, “all those people. And for what? Your ambition? Your greed? How much blood is on your hands?”

“How much is on yours I wonder?”

“It’s not the same.” And even as she said it she felt a chill.

“Blood is blood. Those you’ve killed had lives. Had reasons. Every person believes what they are doing is the right thing. And just because you don’t see doesn’t mean everyone else is wrong. How many of your victims were purer of heart than you I wonder?”

Vex wanted to look at him, wanted to move, wanted to run, but her body was locked in place which only made it worse. “I have done my best to help. You were just a murdering asshole.”

There was a long pause before he said, “There is something here. Below the castle. It hungers. And what is beyond it is…terrible.”

Vex would have ground her teeth but nothing moved. “I know.”

“You believe I did it all for me. I can see why you would see that. But consider this, if you could never die how many lives would you be able to save?”

“How many lives did you take for it?”

“Only the weak. Those who would die from what rose in my place. Those your Cinder King would have torn apart anyways. I said Marquet did not understand me, did I explain why?” Vex did not answer. “Marquet banished me because they discovered my experiments. They did not understand the costs of survival. This creature who lives beyond the orb is not the only evil that has risen in the world. Imagine what I have stopped with my power and imagine what more I could do—you could do—with a life that never ended.”

“It’s not worth it,” but her voice was weak.

“I see it in your mind. I see your home in flames. Once with your mother, once with your city. I see your friend broken and limp before you. I see an old friend frozen, one whose people will forget him, forget what he did. They don’t even know now. I see so many cities, so many dead. And I see you in the middle of it all. With the power you have now you saved the world. With the power you could have, the potential that bubbles within you, you wouldn’t have had to. If you had someone to teach you before Thordak returned you would not have needed to run. You would have been able to stop him before he destroyed everything. The lives of a handful outweigh the world? Outweigh the destruction that came because you were not strong enough?” The voice wormed deeper, striking her chest and mind. “What comes next is much worse than you ever imagined. Do you really believe you can stop it the way you are?” Vex felt like ice was spreading from the center of her chest out.

“No.” She couldn’t lie. She knew, deep down she knew. And there was no sense in lying.

“The beast rose against me before I could complete my work. I cannot take hold of a new body, my soul is not strong enough to take a new form. But I can teach you. I may not be able to continue, to save the world, but I can assist you, teach you the ways of magic, show you power you could never have imagined but you will not be able to win without. Allow me to assist you, Vex’ahlia.”

She held her breath, it was a terrible idea. But Vox Machina ran on terrible ideas. “And the others?”

“Will never need to know. You can leave tonight. Take the book and make your way to Wildmount first. I was born there, spent many of my years there before moving to Marquet. I can show you somewhere to work where nobody will find you.”

“I can’t—I can’t just leave them.”

“You must. They are not strong enough to take this on. You must do it for them. You must end it before it begins. And they will only stand in your way.”

“I—”

“My power wanes. I require an answer. Will you take my help or will you condemn the world to death?”

“I—yes…I want your help…” she said quietly.

And then she flipped the page.

Opash’s elegant, curled letters ended abruptly in the middle of an experiment. “I was on the right track when it happened,” the voice hissed in her ear.

The writing was less poetic, the pen had dug into the page with anger behind it, it was less of an attempt to keep a lonely man sane and more focused on the equation itself. There were mentions of J’Mon Sa Ord, the writer called himself the “king that rises from the ashes”. It was the writing of Thordak.

“I had lowered my guard, thought the beast was mine. That he could never overtake me. And it was my folly. He murdered me while my back was turned, like the animal he was. And he took over my work.”

Thordak had been obsessed with the ritual Guuthal did and searched for a way to do the ritual himself and become an undying entity. The pages finished with the desire to go north and gather mages and things he could bind to his will that he could bring back to make the ritual happen.

And that was all. There were only a handful of blank pages after that. She closed the book and stepped away.

The others had only seen Vex flipping through pages at a terrifying speed, unblinking eyes scanning each one at a rapid pace. It had been unnatural. And when she stepped away they quietly asked if she was okay. She nodded and Grog asked, “Bad story?”

She did not answer that directly and instead told them of what she read, leaving out a few choice pieces like the caverns in Marquet and the intimate details of some of his work. And when she finished there was an uneasy silence that hung in the air while everyone took it all in.

“Pike…” Percy said, turning to face the gnome, “can we destroy this thing?”

Pike looked like she was ready to agree but Vex stepped in, “I’m not sure destroying it is the best option. I think…maybe it’s best in Vasselheim or somewhere it can be watched.”

Percy looked her over carefully while everyone discussed what they thought about the idea. Percy was not unfamiliar with dark beings and the bonds they make with living souls. And while it was not anything he could pick out of a crowd he could see the change in the woman he loved. There was a shadow in her eyes, there was a twitch in her fingers, an urgency to her voice. There was something _not right_ that she was hiding.

“Vex is right. The knowledge is out now, out of the book.” He looked Vex in the eye, “There is something in there. Something that wants out. It should be watched.”

Vex stayed quiet after that, Percy only spoke when someone directed something his way. The rest of the time he was focused on Vex.

 

Vex snuck into Grog’s room that night while he slept. The bag of holding was on the floor beside the bed and he snored loudly. The bed bowed beneath his weight in the pitch black of the room. Rain hit the windows, the sound covered her steps and kept the moon from shining in on her. She silently reached into the bag and withdrew the book. She dropped it into her own bag and crept out of the room.

When she shut the door behind her and turned she saw Percy. He wore his jacket, his boots, Bad News on his back and Animus on his hip. “Where are we going?”

She had hoped he wouldn’t find out until the morning. They weren’t sleeping together every night and she had decided it was best not to tonight, as much as she wanted to. “We aren’t going anywhere.” It was such a blatant lie, she looked like she was prepared to go to battle.

He smiled softly, a sad look touched his eyes, “I already told you, I’m staying by your side. No matter what.”

“Percy,” Vex touched his cheek, “as much as I—”

“I’m coming with you.” He touched his forehead to hers and closed his eyes, “I’m not waking up tomorrow without you.”

She smiled and took a moment to just be with Percy, to let his reassuring presence wash over her. “I’m going to Wildmount.”

“I’m coming with you,” he said again.

“Opash…he told me he can help us with Vecna. But…what I’ll have to do…it won’t be good. It won’t be anything you’ll want to be involved with.”

“I want to be involved with you. And you need someone to help keep you balanced. Let me come with you.” On the inside he thought of his own dark things, what he had done in the past. And he thought of how no matter how dark he had been Vex had dragged him into the light, even if it was a dim light. His guns alone had been a source of impending doom, he feared what would come of them. And Vex still told him it was the right thing. She balanced him, now it was his turn to balance her.

“I was dreading leaving you,” she admitted quietly.

“Then don’t.”

There was a beat of silence before she said, “We have to go now. They can’t know where we are.”

And so they stole out of the house in the middle of the night with their friends none the wiser and began their journey to Wildmount.


	2. NecRomantic

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Do you like listening to music that kind of goes with the fic you're reading? I have a spotify playlist for this if that's your thing. It's called If You Turn Evil, It's Still Cool (Perc'ahlia) and my username is rowanpuck. And that's probably the last time I'll bring it up but I thought I'd do it this time in case you missed it last time.

Percy and Vex travelled far and fast. Vex knew Keyleth would scry on them and the knowledge flooded her mind as they ran into the night. Had they woken? Had they found her missing? Did they fear the worst for the two of them? Did they know was gone too? Were they looking for them? Did they know the deal she made?

Vex pushed her hood off and looked up at the sky. It was still black and heavy clouds blocked any moonlight that might have given them away. Rain poured and washed away their tracks but that was not the only way to find someone. Vex believed they had a little more time until they woke up and got worried enough to scry. And it was while she was thinking of how to avoid it that a familiar slimy voice came into her mind.

“There are magics to avoid unwanted sight.”

Vex’s eyes drifted up to Percy who was focused on the road ahead. He had his hood flicked up to hide his hair, they were far too close to home for either of them to feel comfortable walking about without trying to hide themselves. She didn’t answer. Of course Percy wouldn’t exactly judge talking to a dark voice nobody else could hear but it wasn’t something she wanted to do if she could avoid it.

Opash wasn’t fazed. “It is simple but will not last forever. You must keep recasting it until you reach my old home, that place will hide you. Until then, use this,” and he whispered the words in her ear and it felt like the wind showed her fingers how to move. It did not come immediately, she listened to him repeat the words and repeated the finger movements again and again until she finally felt comfortable trying it for herself.

When Vex cast the spell Percy stopped and looked at her. “Vex?” Fear touched his voice and concern flooded his eyes. “Vex are you okay?”

She smiled weakly and touched his cheek, feeling the rough stubble forming. It took a second but he leaned into her touch and closed his eyes, letting out a small sigh. “I’m fine, dear. I…just thought it would be best if Keyleth couldn’t find us. It will only last a few hours before I have to recast it.”

“You do magic now?” He asked, not accusingly just curious. She had a few spells up her sleeve before but not like this.

“I guess. I don’t really know what’s going to change.” She waited a beat, the two just standing in the woods with rain falling heavy on them. “You can still go home.”

“You are my home.”

It knocked the breath out of her. She had to close her eyes and remind herself of the stakes. For a second she almost threw the book into the mud and went back. Or maybe she almost ran away with Percy, from everyone. From their friends, from Opash, from Vecna. “I’m sorry.” She finally whispered.

“If you believe this is worth it I believe you. I’m not exactly one to lecture on dark forces.” He had a small smile, half teasing half filled with memories and regret.

“You are not a dark force,” she reminded him.

“And neither are you.” He leaned down and kissed her. Their lips slid against each other’s in the rain and Vex sighed into him. It was like it had been every time before. She had been afraid it wouldn’t happen at all or that it would be different, that it would be filled with fear of her. But it was just Percy.

Thunder cracked and Percy pulled away slowly and looked up at the sky. “We should keep going. We have a long way to go.”

“Stay close to me,” she said as she flipped her hood back up. The spell only had a 30 foot radius and she didn’t want to take chances.

“Always.” He took her hand and laced their fingers together.

 

It wasn’t necessarily that the spell was enormously difficult, but it certainly wasn’t easy and took much more out of her than she thought it would. By the time they settled down to camp Vex felt a little lightheaded and it didn’t take much convincing to get her to sit against a tree while Percy gathered some firewood.

As he tried to find some that wasn’t soaked through within the radius of the spell Vex reached up to touch her nose and when she pulled her thumb away there was a spot of blood.

“You are not strong enough yet. But there is no other choice if you wish to stay hidden.” She hated his voice coming and going freely in her mind like this.

“I can’t keep it up like this.”

“No. You can’t.” She had expected him to tell her she could, to tell her to do it anyways. She expected to feel a little more resolved rather than torn down. “You must find someone who can send somewhere close. You will not make the journey like this.”

Percy came back and she wiped the blood away before he could see it. “Thank you,” she said and sat up to light the fire for them.

“How are you feeling?” He asked and watched her intently.

“I’m not strong enough to do this the whole time,” she admitted, “we have to find a faster way there.”

He nodded. “I’ve been thinking about that too. We can’t exactly go to Emon for it though, the others would find out where we went.”

“So what are you thinking?” Vex pulled rations from her pack and handed some to Percy who frowned at them. Grog had definitely carried the better food.

He shook his head, “I don’t know. But we have to figure something out.”

 

Vex had a hard time paying attention to Percy when he told her what city they were in. It was somewhere she wasn’t familiar with and any other day she would have loved to listen to Percy tell her about it, but right now her head was throbbing and she wasn’t feeling well. Percy didn’t hold it against her though. He had a feeling whatever was with her wasn’t the easiest thing to deal with.

Percy was eager to get to Wildmount for a few reasons. First and foremost was Vex needed a break. Whatever magic she was doing was out of her league right now, it was breaking her. And Percy wanted to get her somewhere she could take it easy for a moment, where she wasn’t having to push herself like this. The second reason was if this was where Opash had lived for a time there might be information on him. Perhaps he could find a way to help Vex.

He had not lied when he said he would follow Vex anywhere, but he also didn’t want her to lose herself to something like that. She had saved him so many times before, he couldn’t just watch her be swallowed by something like he had been.

And he had never been here before, but in his mind that was an asset. It meant the others wouldn’t look here first and that the townspeople might not be so keen to give them all the information on where he and Vex went. So while he was cautious as he asked around he was not hiding out in alleys and sneaking about.

They were directed to a small magic bookshop. Vex looped her arm through Percy’s and leaned into him and he helped carry her through the door without making a scene. Vex wasn’t one to ask for help so easily, it only worried Percy more. She noticed and her thumb rubbed his arm, “I just recast, in a minute I’ll be fine.”

Percy nodded but wasn’t so sure. Instead he led her to the counter where an old man was leaning over an old book with a magnifying glass. “If you’re looking for _100 Cures, The Secret to Lockpicking, and How to Woo a Paladin_ it still hasn’t come in from my Vasselheim shipment.”

Percy’s forehead creased as he tried to consider what kind of book had all of that in it. “No, no we’re not looking for…that. We are looking for a way to Wildmount.”

The watery blue eyes of the shopkeeper slowly looked up to meet Percy’s. He huffed and said, “Don’t know who told you to come here. All we have is books. I suggest you be on your way.”

“He doesn’t know who he speaks to,” the voice whispered, curling around Vex.

“I know you have a way to get us there. And we have no issue paying you to help us. But if you send us away now we will only come back, and maybe not in the way you want.” Percy’s eyes stared down at the old man.

He sneered and pointed to the door, “Get out, I don’t need your kind here.”

Percy went to say something and Vex looked around the shop.

“There,” Opash said as Vex saw a book on a low shelf behind the counter with an odd symbol on it. She had seen it before in the journal, scribbled at the bottom of a few pages about his research on Guuthal.

“Have you ever heard of Guuthal the Ever-Fed?” The words came from Vex’s mouth without thought.

Silence fell across the room and the man cleared his throat after a minute. “No.”

“He’s not a very common story, is he? In fact there are a lot of stories that not many know anymore. I heard about one. A man from Marquet.” Her eyes flashed and she stood just a fraction taller, “I heard he may have started in Wildmount, close to where we’re trying to go.”

The man looked between Vex and Percy for a long time. “Interesting. Most of the time those legends…forget where they begin. Usually that kind of knowledge is given to those who guard the truth of it.”

“Yes that’s terribly interesting but I don’t think you understand. I am getting to Wildmount in the next three hours. So, if you don’t want to find yourself on the wrong side of me you’re going to send me there. Now. And if you do it nicely then I’ll keep that in mind.”

The old man turned slowly and stooped low, for a moment Vex wanted to help him because this frail old man looked like her was going to break a lot of bones when he fell. She also almost regretted the little threat. But he grabbed the book with the symbol and stood up slowly without issue. “Are you looking for the Ever-Fed?”

“You will be,” Opash hissed.

“I have a feeling it’s on the list,” Vex answered the man.

His shaky hands pushed the thick, old book to her. “He is hell come to earth. Whatever you are, keep it away from my home. Now follow me.” He began to shamble away and Vex swept the book into her bag and followed him with Percy on her arm.

They went to a back room with a teleportation sigil on the floor. “This might not be much help,” he grunted as he moved some chairs off of it. “It doesn’t go to any city. It goes to an old keep that was torn down in a war before any of us can remember it. It’s nearby though, out in the woods. I used to use it when I was younger, now it is my grandson who patrols out there, looking for lost information on…” he paused and looked at Vex.

“On Opash.” She stepped forward to the edge of the circle.

He nodded, seeming satisfied, “Yes, on the master.” Percy didn’t look like he had even heard but the muscles in his bicep tensed for a moment and Vex understood. People talking about a dead and shitty necromancer like that was probably not a good sign. “It is more formality now, we have not found anything since before my father’s time. Until you, I suppose.”

“We found where he was banished to from Marquet,” she answered, her tone cool. She was ready to go why wouldn’t he just get on with it?

The man stopped clearing the sigil and reached out to her, “Where?”

Percy lifted his chin, an almost sneer forming, “Watch yourself.” The man hesitated and lowered his hands. “It was an island. And it’s gone. We destroyed it.”

“You…you what?” Anger flashed through his eyes but Percy stared him down.

“It had been a lair to something that wished to use his research for themselves. It had been corrupted. We took the information we wanted and what we thought was useful and then we sank it.” A lie obviously, but they didn’t need people trying to find it.

He nodded slowly, angrily, but it seemed Percy had handled it. The old man didn’t speak much more as he prepared and silently gestured for them to step into the sigil.

“I hope your work goes well. Bring this world into a new age.” He then spoke in words Vex didn’t understand and there was the sickening feeling of being transported to somewhere very far from where they were. She missed Keyleth’s easy and gentle doorways in the trees.

Honestly she just missed Keyleth.

They popped into a crumbling stone keep and Vex dropped to her knees and cried. Percy held her close to him, he kissed the top of her head, and didn’t say anything. There was nothing he really could say.

 

Opash guided them through the woods and the mountains until they stood in front of a small, barely noticeable cave. And when they walked in there was no path that led farther in, it was just as small as it looked. But Opash insisted this was it. He told them to look for his symbol.

It took time, both of them inspecting the walls and running their hands over the stone to try and feel for it perhaps, but eventually Vex found it. It was very faded and in a high corner but when she saw it she knew it could be nothing but Opash’s. It was a red handprint, now almost worn away, and in the palm was what looked like a black flame and surrounding the whole hand it looked like the outline of a black eight pointed star.

“Press your hand to it, Vex’ahlia,” he whispered and she swore it echoed in the small cave.

She was on her broom which was how she had seen it to begin with so it didn’t take much for her to stretch her arm out and place it inside the slightly larger handprint. Nothing happened.

“It is missing something, it had been too long, it does not trust you.”

Vex felt a little like she was in a trance as she brought her hand back to her and her other hand touched the dagger she kept on her hip just in case. It was a simple dagger, not good for much other than sawing through a rope. And for slicing an inch long cut into her hand.

She didn’t feel the pain. She did hear Percy call out her name, worry heavy in the sound, but she pressed on. She knew what Opash meant, she knew what the mark wanted. She knew why the handprint was red.

She pressed the now bloodied hand to the wall again and there was a beat where nothing happened. And then stone scraped along stone and the back wall slid away to show a huge cavern.

She floated down to Percy and hopped off the broom. He grabbed her hand and looked at it closely. “Vex,” he said quietly.

“I know…” she didn’t take her hand from him but she did watch a pale green light wrap around the palm and dance like smoke as she closed the wound. There wasn’t even a mark when she was done. “But we had to get in.”

He nodded slowly. “Be careful.”

She touched his cheek and he pressed his forehead to hers and they both closed their eyes. “That’s what you’re here for, isn’t it darling?”

He smiled, “And here I thought this was just a date.”

“Oh it’s that too, we’re putting the romance in necromancy.”

That made Percy throw his head back and laugh, he gripped his chest and his cheeks turned red and when he looked back at her, both of them breathless from the laughing and the air around them lighter from the break in the tension. “I love you,” he said, his eyes soft and for a moment they were back home and everything was normal.

“I love you,” she answered.

“We’re so in over our heads, aren’t we?” He asked and looked into the darkness.

“Oh definitely. But that’s not really anything new.”

“No, I suppose it isn’t.” He took a deep, steadying breath and looked over a Vex again. “Are you ready to go in, my love?”

She looped her am through his, “As long as you are.”

He nodded and they waited another couple seconds, neither exactly ready, and together they took their first step into Opash’s oldest lair.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kay this is the Important Author's Note  
> I ask for feedback a lot but this is kind of a really big deal in how this story goes because I didn't think about this.  
> You can't exactly have a DnD styled story like this with two ranged characters. Which brings me to the issue of now I have to bring in new characters that we haven't seen because the way this story is set up it doesn't make sense for VM to all go dark like this. My question is this, would you want to see a full party of OCs that are very important to the story or do you want to really see minions who are around for action scenes but don't have much to do for the story? If you want real, full characters do you want specific races or classes you've never seen? Do you want to like them or hate them? Normally I can ask for feedback and if I don't get any that's fine because I have plans I can use instead but I think that this is a really big decision and I want to know where you stand. You didn't come here to see me write my own characters you came her for fun Dark Perc'ahlia. So I really desperately care what you think. I can do it on my own but this is kind of your chance to say, "hey I really want to see a drow bladesinger, or I really like the idea of a shadowcaster and how they use mysteries, I would like to see a Trickster Knight or Death Knight. I have no idea where to start and I want to know what interests you because if you don't want to see OCs that much then I'm not going to really add OCs, I'll just have her start finding minions, but if you want to see new characters and dynamics and stuff I can totally do that, like I'm a professional author who writes original fantasy fiction, fanfic is something I just recently picked up, but I still don't know where people stand or what they want when it comes to fic and I really would love some help. And be honest, like if you don't want OCs I want to know that, I'm not going to be upset or anything.  
> ANYWAYS  
> If that dracolich is Guuthal I'm going to die because like a month and a half ago when I was transcribing and listening to Matt's description of Opash's journal and he did all that cool talk about Guuthal and then the damn thing never came up ever again I was so made because what a waste of a cool bad guy right? And I was like I'm just going to make it an important thing in my fic! I'm going to talk about it and have important things about it here instead! And I'm going to do what I want because Matt didn't give me any more of him! Dragons and liches are my favorite things and I have been cheated out of a dracolich! And then Ep 112 happens and I'm listening to him talk about seeing a dracolich and I just want to say I called it. It's gonna Guuthal. And somehow Matt broke into my laptop and stole the notes I don't have on this fic and is taking my ideas. (That's a lie, he's obviously not doing that, but I should have been writing like a chapter a day so that when it's revealed to be Guuthal it was obvious that I was already there) (Also now that I'm talking about this it's totally gonna be some random dragon or Thordak or Raishan or something and I'm going to look so dumb).  
> So I think that's that, sorry for the super long note (sorry there's two honestly) and I hope you're digging the story and our dark but super romantic power couple. Please gods let me know what you want to see. And it doesn't have to be just about forming a new party, it can be like, ideas for things you want to see. I have almost no planning in this book, I would love to give you guys what you want. I'm so eager to please, I swear.


	3. Sounds Like a Cult Thing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the wait. And for anyone in Las Vegas I am so sorry and if you need to talk my inbox is always open.  
> Hope you like my OCs for this, uh let me know if there's anything specific you want to see or anything you like or don't like, things are still up in the air for them. I made them Character Sheets and they have little pages on their magical items/equipment and all that so they're like real characters.

Vex slept for a long time as she recovered from the overuse of magic. And while she did Percy took care of her as best he could given the circumstances. He made her food from what she had in her Bag of Colding and while it wasn’t the best meal they’d had it certainly helped. She said they were safe in here without the magic, but Percy still went about setting up traps and alarms for in case they were found. But the better part of the next two days were just him keeping a close eye on Vex.

After she recovered she spent many hours in a room she said would be best if Percy never went in. There was nothing really wrong with the room, but she wanted to keep Percy as far from Opash as she could, he didn’t exactly have the best record with beings trying to make shady deals. Then again, she doubted she was one to talk now.

What happened after was really quite boring. Vex and Percy spent their time together reading, practicing their marksmanship, Percy helped Vex practice some of the more simple spells she had been learning, and after a few days they started having sex again. In truth their new life was much less exciting and terrible than either of them expected, but things had to change eventually.

Vex and Percy decided to take a walk. It was a good excuse to get out of the hideout and for Vex to practice some magic. She focused on keeping them hidden from Keyleth’s view, who was no doubt still hoping to scry on them, and she practiced new spells she had learned. Mostly small ones, a little fire here, a raised squirrel there. Small things. Granted not all of them made either of them comfortable but Vex believed this was what she needed to do and Percy knew Vex would do what she truly believed was best. To put it very simple Percy put every ounce of faith in Vex and he always had.

“ _Don’t look up,_ ” a voice teased in their mind, thick and smooth and not at all Opash’s.

And of course they both turned their eyes up.

A dark haired man was in the trees. He scowled down at them and jumped, a longsword in one hand and a dagger in the other. Before Percy could even pull his gun the man dropped on them, taking them both to the ground. He rolled off and immediately heavy black ribbons wrapped around them and tugged them to their feet, leaving the sting of magic that sapped a way a little of their health. Vex was familiar enough to know it was necromantic energy in the shadowy cloth that clung to them.

“I told you not to look up,” the voice from earlier said behind them.

“You shouldn’t have said anything,” the man from the trees slid his sword into its sheath and held the point of the dagger out to them. “What are you doing out here?”

“ _Tell him you came looking to fuck his mother,_ ” the voice rang in her ears, followed by a snicker from behind her.

“I’m getting sick and tired of everyone speaking in my head all the damn time,” Vex growled out. She would have cast a threatening look behind her but found it best to keep her attention on the man with the knife. “As for what I’m doing here, how about you mind your own fuc—”

“We’re looking for adventure. Isn’t that what most people out in the woods are doing?” Percy was calm, despite the fact he could feel the tip of a dagger against his back. Surprising since the voice that came from behind them was easily fifteen feet away.

Someone huffed behind them and the voice said, “This was much more boring than I thought it’d be.”

“Annik,” the man in front of them warned lightly without looking away from Vex. “You’re looking for adventure?” He looked them up and down carefully, “You look familiar with it.”

“Yeah, we are. We’re the best.” She was not in the mood. She was lucky she hadn’t lost concentration on her spell, that would be all she needed.

“Really? Interesting since you’re both obviously ranged attackers. Must be hard. Where’s the rest of your team?”

Vex’s blood ran cold. It was Percy who answered, quietly, carefully, a voice filled with sorrow. “Gone.”

The man’s green eyes narrowed. “So you came out looking for more trouble?”

Vex spoke without thinking, feeling Opash’s quiet presence in her mind push her forward, “I came looking for a way to save the world.”

And this caused him to lower the blade slightly. He stepped closer, looking at her with renewed interest in his eyes. “How did you get here?”

“That’s none of your business,” she replied through clenched teeth.

The ribbons fell away and someone behind her yawned. “Trystan, they’re terribly boring. You’re getting boring. I thought we were looking for that guy or whatever. If I’d known they’d be boring I wouldn’t have said anything.”

“How did you get here?” He demanded again.

“We teleported. There was a man in a bookstore who offered to let us through, said there was good hunting in the area and that we might find what we’re looking for.” Percy knew the odds were not in their favor. Of course he had his sword but the man before them was a heavy hitter. Sure Vex had a dagger but there was no way they would be getting out of range quick enough or long enough for this fight to last. Not without someone like Grog. Their best option was to tell half lies and get out of this peacefully.

“Why did my grandfather send you through?” Trystan looked suspicious and at least a little angry.

“Oh, I lied, this might be a little interesting.” The voice behind them was unnerving but the man in front of them was a more direct concern.

“I was looking for a place to relax. Heard about a guy from a long time ago who might have lived here, might have left some stuff for us to find.” Vex’s hand touched the hilt of her own dagger. Percy stayed very still with the tip of a blade against his back.

“Who are you looking for? What’s his name?” Trystan’s knuckles were white around the hilt of his dagger and he seemed to tremble from—from what? Excitement? Fear?

“Opash,” Vex slid her dagger free and held it by her side.

Trystan lowered his. “There’s nothing of him left out here. Gone, destroyed, lost. Doesn’t matter. There’s nothing to find.” There was a hollow tone to his voice and he finally looked away from Vex, making eye contact with the one behind them. “We should go, Annik,” He said and started to walk past them and the dagger left Percy’s back.

Vex bit her lip and looked at Percy. “Wait,” she said. Percy nodded. He wanted to say they couldn’t do this alone. That they couldn’t do the kind of fights they once did, not when it was only the two of them. “Maybe you just weren’t looking hard enough.” If this Trystan guy was the grandson of the storekeeper then he might be someone they wanted on their side.

Suddenly shadows pooled in front of Vex and a figure rose from them. “I knew you would be fun,” the silk voice said with a wicked grin that showed his teeth.

The man before them, which they assumed to be Annik, was nothing like Vex expected. His skin was dark red, his body lean with muscle and tall. His eyes were like liquid silver, seeming to shift and move in the light, and his hair was as black as the horns that extended from his head. And his horns. They made Vex ache. One because for a moment she remembered Zahra, Zahra who she had not thought about losing when she made her choice. And second because they reminded her of Keyleth, who she had not stopped thinking about when she made her choice. His horns came out from his head and branched out, like the limbs a terribly old tree, or perhaps more like antlers. Much like her favorite druid’s. His were black as pitch though and carved into them were intricate patterns dyed brilliant gold.

In truth the tiefling was very handsome, with a devilish smirk that played on his lips and a tail the flicked back and forth. But he was also off looking. Not only his unusual horns but shadows seemed to cling to him, and not in the way they had to Vax. Vax was simply very good at hiding in shadows, blending in with them, but this was like shadows emanated from the tiefling. They wrapped around him like a thick cloak. There were circles under his eyes, well what Vex assumed to be circles it was hard to tell with tieflings, and he looked generally dark. His armor was made of jade and black scales and the sheath of the sword at his side was so dark it made her uncomfortable to look at. But more than anything what unnerved Vex was that he had called her _fun_.

“What do you mean?” Trystan asked quietly from behind her.

She would have turned her back on Annik to answer, but she suddenly found herself worried if she turned from him she would regret it. “Opash lived somewhere in Wildmount before he went to Marquet. It didn’t just disappear.”

“It probably was torn down or was bought and sold a hundred times with no one the wiser. It’s gone. I’ve spent two years looking for it.”

“And you weren’t looking hard enough. Why were you looking for him?”

Trystan walked back and stood in front of her beside Annik. His eyes were deep green, his hair was brown and it was obvious he hadn’t cut it in a long time. His armor was made of interlocking, bright plates and heavy duty leather. Vex believed it did more than just look pretty. At his hip were two daggers and a long sword. His face was made of sharp angles and all in all he was average except for the extremely intense gaze he had. “Because if he could complete his work we would be saved.”

 _Yikes_ , Vex thought but then reprimanded herself because wasn’t that why she was looking for him too? Perhaps less like a cult follower, but still. “Saved from what?”

“Whatever we need to be saved from.”

Vague. Definitely a cult. But eager. And perhaps that was what she needed. If she believed in such things she may have called it fate. “And you?” She asked the strange teifling.

He shrugged, “I’m mostly just looking for something interesting to do,” his silver eyes flashed and the smirk grew on his lips, “but if you have something that will get me written down in history I might be so inclined to come along.”

She wasn’t sure what to say next? Follow me, aid me, help me?

Percy however was a little more versed in things like this, it was what made soldiers want to follow their lord. Though perhaps a little less culty. “Vex’ahlia has been chosen by Opash to tear down the largest threat to the world since the Calamity. Opash is teaching her his ways, helping her continue his research, and his guiding her in this path. If you wish to follow Opash you must follow Vex’ahlia, it is by her will that he has any voice in this world at all. And if you wish to be remembered, saving the world is certainly the way to do it.”

Trystan looked like a small animal caught between desire and fear. “How do I know you’re telling the truth?”

Vex reached into her bag and pulled out Opash’s journal, the book cool to the touch from the effects of the bag. She didn’t hand it to him, only held it, but it was obvious he was hooked. “He stored a piece of himself in this journal. And when I read it he came to me and told me he knew the threat I faced. He does not have the power to bring himself back and so he has instead agreed to help me. The entrance of his old hideout only opened with the blood from someone who Opash himself deemed a friend.” That part was arguable. “You can keep wandering these woods looking for people to almost kill or you can do something.”

Annik licked his lips, “I would love to help you out, at least to see what things are like.”

Trystan looked like he was far away but nodded, “I want to help.” His voice was soft and distant, like he was deep in thought.

“Good. We’ll take you back, if we spend much longer out here I won’t be able to hide us from prying eyes,” Vex cast a quick look up at the sky, only a few white clouds drifted along in it. And then she began the walk back to the cave. Percy walked beside her and her two new—what were they? Followers? Assistants? Minions?—members of her team followed behind.

 

Annik disappeared shortly after they returned, which definitely made Vex nervous. Trystan obviously noticed this and said, “He seems worse than he is. He is a better man than he wants you to believe, albeit a little unpredictable.”

Scanlan flashed into her mind and she cleared her throat awkwardly to avoid thinking of him and inevitably start crying again, “I can handle unpredictable.”

Percy’s hand touched the small of her back and she let out a sigh, grateful for the simple touch. “And you?”

“Yes, of course.” Trystan held his hand out, “I am Trystan Atus, a Hand to the Shroud of Opash.” Definitely a cult.

Vex took his hand and shook it, then Percy did the same. Vex began to walk down to the small dining room as she spoke, “Nice to meet you, Trystan. I’m Vex, this is Percy. To be quite honest, I’m not sure what our next step is or how long it will be until we do what we are meant to do.” She looked over her shoulder at him, “I would understand if you wanted to leave.”

“I have waited my whole life for this. I won’t leave now.”

She arched an eyebrow at him, “Your entire life?”

“My grandfather taught me about Opash. He taught me everything I know about everything. And one of the things he told me was why one of the ranks in the Shroud was called the Hands. Because Opash needed strong hands to bring him back to this world. And after hearing about him, about how he was unfairly banished and his work stalled, about how his work would have changed the world, I swore to my grandfather that if he needed hands to bring him back I would have the strongest two to do it with. Our meeting was not coincidence, he knew I could be the one to help him return.” There was a look of pure faith in his eyes. It was, to be honest, unnerving.

“You see him as a god?” Percy asked coolly but not unkindly.

“I see him as more than a god, he is a hero. He is the one who would save us while the gods condemned us.”

 _Well_ , Vex thought, _that is certainly strange._ She nodded and said, “And now it is you who will help do just that.” His eyes were filled to the brim with passion and awe, “Now get yourself something to eat and a room to sleep in. I will find you if I need you.”

“Of course,” he bowed his head to her and left.

Percy and Vex did not say anything about him until they were in their own room.

“He is…an odd one,” Percy said slowly.

“He’s crazy. We should have left him in the woods.”

He moved to help her out of her armor, slowly undoing the buckles. It was comfortable, familiar, even in such a strange place. “We are a little short on friends right now, I’m not sure we can afford to send away the crazy ones. After all, everything we’re talking about doing is crazy.”

Her shoulders drooped and she looked at the ground, “Crazy never stopped them.”

He kissed her shoulder softly, “And they were all crazy as well. We don’t know, these two could be good. Perhaps not family, perhaps not like them, but they could be very helpful. Most of all they won’t try and stop us from doing what we have to do.”

She nodded, “I know.”

They read by candlelight for a little more than an hour before Vex heard, “ _You haven’t even come looking for me. You’re quite trusting, aren’t you?_ ”

She looked to Percy but he made no signs that he had heard. She huffed and said to him, “He’s doing it again. Talking in my mind.” His blue eyes showed his worry and Vex cut him off before he began to speak, “Not Opash. The tiefling. Annik or whatever.”

“Oh.” He frowned, “I was not exactly a fan of that.”

“No, neither am I.”

“ _I know you can hear me. Come outside, I’m sure you’re filled to the brim with questions and I’m much prettier than your white haired boyfriend._ ”

Vex rolled her eyes and stood up, “I believe he wants to talk, dear. I’ll be back soon.”

He nodded and slowly returned to reading as Vex walked outside.

There, leaning against the wall opposite the door, was the tiefling. “Don’t tell him I said that, I wouldn’t want to ruin my chances with him.” Annik smiled and his tail swished behind him.

“Watch yourself, I don’t like you nearly enough for you to be talking about him like that.”

“Possessive, it’s sweet.” She scowled and he tilted his head down the hallway, “Let’s walk.”

She walked with him for a time and they came to a small library of books that were mostly falling apart. Annik dropped into a chair and crossed his legs, his arms thrown over the back and his head cocked to the side a little as he watched Vex take the seat opposite of him. “Let’s play a game.”

“What game do you want to play?” She asked cautiously.

“You have questions, I have questions. The simple game is you ask one and I ask two.”

“That’s not usually how it works.” Vex did not like being cheated.

His smile never faltered and he only lifted his chin a little higher. “It’s how I play the game. If you don’t like it you can leave and we’ll see what happens.”

She sat very still for a long time before she finally said, “What’s your name?”

He smiled, “Lovely. My name is Annik.”

“And your last name?”

He tsked at her, “Technically that is a second question, but I will let it slide this time. Annik is my family name. My other name is something earned. My turn. What are your names?”

“I’m Vex’ahlia, he is Percival.” She didn’t offer him their nicknames nor anything else. In her mind she decided it was something earned.

“And my second question is who’s on top?” A gleam lit his eyes.

“I am,” she answered casually. It wouldn’t be long before he saw it for himself, she had a feeling he didn’t miss much.

“I figured as much, but it’s so nice to hear I’m right.”

“What are you?”

“Tricky question,” he waggled a finger at her, “You certainly know how to get the most out of your deals, don’t you? I am a tiefling as I’m sure you guessed. But I am not one of your simple Infernal tieflings,” he rolled his eyes, “I’m Abyssal. In my veins runs the blood of demons, not those useless devils. I was raised in the Abyss, my family was, I suppose, low ranking nobility. Of the few Abyssal tiefling families that still lived there we were the best. As for my magic, I’m a Shadowcaster.”

Shadowcaster. Vex had never heard of it and he offered no more information. “Your turn.”

“Where is the rest of your team? Percival,” he drew the name out, “only said they were gone. He didn’t say they died.”

“They’re back home. We left, they stayed. They’re not willing to do what it takes.” She found it pointless to try and lie to him, even if he believed her it would be another lie to remember telling, another lie to keep track of. The easiest thing would be half-truths.

He hummed and tapped his chin as he pretended to think. “What does he do?”

“He shoots things for me,” Vex replied with a chill in her voice.

“A lovely talent.”

“I have better aim.” It was a thinly veiled threat. Stay away from him.

“I bet you do.” He winked and nodded to her for her to ask a question.

“What is a Shadowcaster?”

He nodded. “Straightforward. You know what you want and don’t beat around the bush. A Shadowcaster uses Shadow Magic. It’s wonderfully useful. It’s how I can speak with you telepathically. You can answer back, by the way. I can teleport us to or from the Plane of Shadow. I can dispel other people’s magic occasionally, I can teleport around like, oh what do you call it? Dimension Door? I can do all sorts of things. Do you have any family?”

She grit her teeth. “Yes.”

“Oh, didn’t like that very much. Do you put your faith in the gods?”

“Not if I can help it. Where did you learn to be a Shadowcaster?”

Annik narrowed his eyes. “It seems like someone is trying to unlock my tragic backstory far too early. I believe we are done for the night.” He smiled again but this time it felt unnatural, “I will see you tomorrow Vex’ahlia.” And then he stepped into a pool of shadows and disappeared.

Vex sat in the library for a long while before returning to Percy and the two of them went to bed, hoping tomorrow would be less weird and would hopefully bring them a step closer to defeating Vecna.


	4. The Man Who Does Not Sleep

They had been holed up for three weeks and every day Vex was being pushed harder and more urgently than the last. She was rising quickly though and when she hit a wall Percy was always there to help, especially with Opash’s research. Vex was smart but she wasn’t a scientist, Percy on the other hand found it easy enough to understand. Vex could tell he wasn’t exactly comfortable with all of it (especially when he read a page discussing rumors of a white stone in Tal’Dorei that might be interesting to use in his tests), but he wasn’t afraid of it which was more than she could say some days. He was, if anything, intrigued. For now it was all theoretical and Percy found that he had to think in unusual ways and stretch his mind to find answers, something he didn’t realize he missed so much.

In the third week Vex learned how to become invisible. It was an exciting moment for her. She and Percy timed how long she could remain like that and did a number of things to see what the constraints of it were, like how anything she picked up remained visible until she put it in her pocket or hid it under her clothes. These were important tests not only because it was important to understand the spells she could cast but also because they had something they needed it for.

Having Annik and Trystan around was odd enough on its own. Trystan looked at Vex like at any moment she might tell him the word of a god, which was strange but nothing major. Annik however was just not right. For instance, the man never slept. It wasn’t like he didn’t sleep much or like Vex just never noticed or he just never mentioned it, it was that he _never slept_. Well, perhaps never was not exactly the right word but it was the closest one they knew.

The first night Annik was there he went to his room and in the morning he complained about how terrible the bed had been. Then he shrugged and said he just wouldn’t use it much. And he didn’t.

The next time he used it was seven days later.

Vex knew this because he took a spot in the library and stayed there for three days. He moved only when he was putting back a book and picking out a new one. But he didn’t leave and he didn’t lie down and he didn’t close his eyes to do more than blink. On the third day he stretched and went to the kitchen where he made himself a small meal, ate quickly, and returned to the library. Every morning he asked Vex how she slept and told her he had kept watch throughout the night. Three days later he ate again.

And on the seventh day he yawned and said, “I’m in need of a nap,” and left for a little over an hour, then returned to the library.

In this hour Trystan decided to explain to Vex and Percy. “He does that sometimes,” he said looking toward the door the tiefling had gone through.

“Does what? Act like he’s not human?” Vex asked with an edge to her voice. Fear and the difficulty of her work and the still painful ache for her family made her sharp and quick to anger, especially when it came to weird shit like that.

Trystan only shrugged and said, “He’s not, but that’s unrelated. It’s his magic. The magic he gets from the Shadow Plane affected him in more than just being able to cast spells. He only needs to sleep for an hour or so every week as long as he’s not hurt or casting anything major. And he only needs to eat twice a week. It was…unnerving at first when I found out, but it’s useful. And he’s only acting like this because he feels like he has to show off, he doesn’t know if he likes you yet. He doesn’t want you to think he’s weak.”

Vex felt the same way about him.

Seven days later he went to his room for about an hour and Vex waited fifteen minutes before casting invisibility on herself and cracking his door open to time how long he slept. She tossed a small pebble into the room to see if he woke but he seemed to be sleeping like the dead. That night she talked to Percy about what she wanted to do and he agreed. He didn’t have the same feelings about Annik, Vex suspected he had noticed something she hadn’t, perhaps in a kindred spirit sort of way with another very dark and scary but undoubtedly attractive man, only Annik was not Percy and Vex didn’t trust him.

Seven days later Annik went to his room. Vex waited fifteen minutes before turning invisible. Percy waited outside in the hallway to keep an eye out for Trystan and in case Vex needed help.

The door opened silently and she left it ajar by a few inches as she crept carefully into his room, wary of traps or anything that would make noise. But there was nothing. Annik simply lay in his bed, unnervingly silent and still. Trystan had said that he was a very heavy sleeper when he had been awake for the whole week, which Vex was happy to use to her advantage.

Annik was lying in bed, his dark red skin was a sharp contrast to the white sheets, it looked like heavy, thick blood against the white marble floor of a temple of Sarenrae. It was a disturbing image. His clothes were folded neatly and set on a desk across the room, a simple gray blanket covered most of his lower half except his left foot which stuck out and his tail which hung off the side of the bed.

Vex moved to the desk, careful not to turn her back completely to him, and looked at his casual clothes. They were plain, comfortable enough, nothing special. Off to the side was his armor, made of black scale and jade. She felt a slight pull to it and touched it lightly, her fingers just barely brushing against it. A familiar feeling flooded her and she jerked her hand away. It was powerful armor, that much she was certain of, and somewhere part of her believed it had belonged to someone she knew.

She turned her attention back to the desk. The black sheath sat on it, and as much as Vex believed it should be giving off a vibe or a pull it simply seemed to be a sword. She touched it and nothing happened. She slid the sword an inch out and widened her eyes. Goldsteel, the sword shimmered a lovely gold but Vex had no doubt it was as strong as any weapon Grog had wielded. And still she felt nothing from it, it was just a sword. No doubt magical but nothing ominous.

Beside the sword were two pieces of jewelry. One a simple iron ring. There was no design to it, no words written on the inside, just a plain band. She could sense magic in it, and unlike the others she could get a feel for what it was due to Opash’s research. It was a ring of regeneration, a powerful one at that. She set it back on the table and picked up the second piece, a necklace. It was just a strip of brown leather and a small gold coin with a hole through the center where the leather looped through. She weighed it in her hand, turned it over, looked at it carefully, but it was nothing special. Even the gold was all but useless with a chunk out of it like that. She set it back where she had found it and went to her knees where a small pack leaned against the side of the desk.

She rummaged inside, finding a couple of different potions, a simple dagger, a pen, paper, and inkwell. There was only one thing of real interest in the pack. A large, heavy, tome bound in dark blue leather. Vex picked it up, aware that it now appeared to be a floating book, and flipped it open. Inside were pages and pages of neat, elegant handwriting in a language she couldn’t even begin to understand. But she had seen it before.

She carefully slipped out of the room with the book in her hand and went to Percy. He lifted his eyebrows as he watched the book float to him and held his hand out for it. “We don’t have much time,” Vex warned him quietly, “but I think this might have something in it.”

Percy turned the book around and looked down. His shock did not fade when he saw it. It was written in Celestial, not typically a language learned by tieflings or Abyssal creatures.

He licked his lips and read the first page to himself, he could fill Vex in later but he didn’t feel safe to read out loud right outside of his room.

_For when you learn a real language, my boy, which will probably be long after you have found your place in history. This journal is for you, a condensed version of what I have known through my many many years. You will find that most of the important parts about my hopes for the future are about you, as are the parts I speak of with the most fondness. It is my firm belief that the best thing I have ever done, both in terms of my personal life and the fate of all life to come, was to save you that night. When I touched you I felt the weight of all the lives that would come to rely on you, it is a weight that even I do not envy. I know you fear I will forget you, lose you in all my years, but of it all I have a feeling you will stay with me for all of time to come. I am proud of you, Dema._

_-Tehan_

Percy’s eyebrows came together. It was an inscription in a journal to someone named Dema from someone who sounded as if he had been alive forever. He flipped a few pages farther ahead.

_but I still had no memory of time before this, I was simply a full grown man, not even a man, but I knew this place. It was my first experience of soul recognition. And while my first experience with civilization had gone poorly, my first experience with this had been one of pure elation. It was a simple alter, it had fallen to time and cracks ran up the stone. I have shown you this place, I took you there shortly after we met and many times after, but still I find I cannot describe it to you. It was a hundred thousand past emotions in one moment and I find even now, even after all the time I have spent in front of it in these current memories, that it is clouded. It shifts in front of me, from a bare piece of land I once found to a simple piece of marble I chiseled at with my own hands, I remember each addition like it is happening in this very moment. And when I stood in front of it for the first time and the millionth time I found I could not tell if it had fallen to pieces or if it was grand and new in front of me or if it was somewhere in between. It is why I had looked so closely at you the first time I took you, it is why I asked you to help me rebuild it. But I digress. This is simply an important moment because for the first time in this strange world in this strange body I felt the first tears I had ever cried and yet I was experienced in weeping. And I lay in front of it and experienced my first dream._

Percy flipped about a third of the way through.

_perfecting bodiless walking. I walked through my lives before, a simple observer in my own body. It is terribly frustrating, even for someone who has been doing it for so long. I wanted to tell myself to turn left, to hold back on my strike, to rain fire upon them. I wanted to stop myself, to push myself farther. Every moment of my past I was unsatisfied with. And it was not only my current self who was unhappy with my actions, it was my past selves. In all my years there has been doubt, there has been instinct I felt was wrong, there has been the knowledge that my actions are not enough, that my purpose was not fulfilled. You must understand Dema that when I grabbed your shoulder you were the only instinct I have not regretted. You must understand you are the only decision I have made that I have felt no doubt about._

He flipped again, farther, his eyes skimming quickly. He wished he could spend much longer with this book, understanding everything rather than guessing, but they had precious little time and they needed more current information.

_I found myself in the Abyss. You have always asked why, it has always been your favorite question. “Tehan, why does the sun shine?” “Tehan, why is your skin that color?” “Tehan, why did you take me and not my brother?” “Tehan, why do you know Shadow Magic?” “Tehan, why do they all think shadows are evil?” “Tehan, why were you in the Abyss that day?” I have avoided many of your questions and others I have not given you full answers to. By the time you learn this language I believe you will be ready to understand. I was in the Abyss that day because I had lost my faith. It is not something I am proud of, it is not something I will speak of again. It is not something I wished you to know about me but it essential to my story. I pray you be the only one who ever knows, for an angel who has lost his faith is not an angel any longer. I went to the Abyss to see what it was like. I had no intention of staying or of changing my life that day, in truth I had no intentions of anything. Every moment of my life has been in the hope that I will be a force of good, and yet I am flooded with memories and the knowledge that the little change I have made has led in much death and destruction. Of course this is expected. In many ways I am a tool of a war so old it has no name. I am simply here to destroy, to tear evil down from its perch. And a war like this can only lead to death, there is no victory or ground to be gained. It is understood by most devas that this war will have no end, that we will fight until there is no longer a world to fight for, perhaps longer. And there is collateral of course. I still find myself saying these things in the dead of night where no one can hear me because of all my lives this has been the one where I struggled the most. And I went to the Abyss to see the evil I was facing, perhaps to understand. And I believe if it had not been for you, standing there outside your home on the street I walked down, I would find myself born into the next life as a rakshasa. I believe it is you who saved me from a string of new lives as something so detestable. As I said before, when I took you from that place I did so on pure instinct, there was no thought to my movement. There was no doubt, no fear of your heart, no question of the pain and hell that my action might bring. When I reached for you I felt as if I was standing in front of my alter for the first time once more._

He flipped another stack of pages eagerly, he was nearing the end now.

_and you asked, “Why did I do that, Tehan?” And you broke my heart. This moment follows you as I write this and I know it will follow you much longer. It is because of this that I feel I must dedicate time to it because while I have never mistaken your heart for one of a deva, one fueled by the need to do good, I have known your heart to be rooted in the right thing. This was another answer I denied you, I simply wept and I fear it will have changed you after I am gone. I gave you this ring and it is my fault the curse took you. A curse, Dema, it was not you. But it was a curse I stupidly ignored. I felt the draw of evil in the ring but I thought with me beside you it would be dissuaded. And for so long it seemed to be so. And when you fell I watched you rise again. And then…Dema I am sorry for my arrogance. I cleansed your soul of it, that seed no longer lingers in your heart, but I can see in your eyes that you fear it was your true nature and not something pressed upon you. I did not tell you it was the ring because the ring is safe now and most importantly it will keep you safe. I did not want you to fear your nature, Dema. I have told you again and again, Abyssal or not, tiefling or aasimar, your nature is not your blood. Annik is the name of the demon who carried your blood long ago, Demakis is the name of your heart. It is up to you, Dema, and you will be a man I will admire many years from now when I return. I must admit, it was this instance that has prompted me to leave you. When I finish this journal I will set it on your desk and we will go hunt another creature of evil and I will fall. And when you take me to our friend and he tries to revive me I will refuse to return. I must start anew, I have grown too confident, too arrogant, and it will stifle your growth. I have taught you what you need to begin teaching yourself and if I stay beside you then you will not do the great things I know you must do. I cannot stand in your way. And I know this is hard, Dema, I know that you will place the blame squarely on your shoulders as you are known to do, but there are many great deeds on the horizon and I have read many books to you and told you many stories of my lives and you know it is only in great loss that we can become great heroes._

On the last page were only a few lines.

_I will leave you Dema, but in my next life I believe it will be your name that will be my first piece of soul recognition that will once again set me on my path. I hope I have set you on yours._

_-Your mentor, your teacher, and hopefully your friend,_

_Tehan_

Percy closed the book slowly, rolling the information around in his mind silently. “Percy,” Vex hissed from his right side, “Percy what—”

“Not here,” he whispered and held the book back to her, “Our room.”

He couldn’t see but she pulled a face and then grabbed the book from him and he watched the door open a little more as if blown by the wind and then he waited in silence until he saw the door close, there was a soft click as it did so, and Vex’s small hand grabbed his and they left to their room.

She dropped her invisibility when she entered their room and spun around to face Percy, his eyes still very far away. “What was it? He’s evil, isn’t he?”

He shook his head slowly, “I don’t believe he is.” He looked up at her, his eyes still a little glazed over. “That journal was a gift to him from his mentor.”

She frowned, “Percy that thing was huge, it couldn’t have been a single journal. Opash’s was about that big and it had tons of research notes in it and was technically written from two people and still had a bunch of empty pages. And that was a journal of a man who had no one to talk to and needed to record his experiments. What you read wasn’t just a diary.”

“It was. His mentor was a deva.” It didn’t seem to register for her so he explained a little more, “An angel. They don’t live and die like we do; they don’t die at all actually. They are angels in mortal bodies, when they are killed they are reborn again.”

“Like a rakshasa,” Vex said with a little venom in her mouth and a twinge of regret. She hoped the others would be okay.

He nodded, “Exactly. In fact rakshasas are devas who have turned away from good. This deva saved—” Percy almost said Dema but stopped himself, “Annik from something, I don’t know what. And taught him everything. He believed Annik was going to be a great force of good in the world. The journal was all about this deva’s life and about how he truly believed in Annik. I don’t think he’s read it though, it kept mentioning how Annik didn’t know the language and probably wouldn’t learn it for a very long time.”

“So why is he here?” Vex didn’t seem fully sold on the story, her nose still upturned a little.

“I think he might be wondering if you’re really going to do something that changes the world. I think he actually wants to help.”

Vex crossed her arms over her chest for a long time and looked at the door. Then nodded. “Alright.” She met his eyes. “If you trust him, I trust him.”

A smile tugged at his lips, “I don’t trust anyone but you.”

She touched his cheek and he leaned into her hand a little, “If you believe we should give him a chance, then.”

He nodded, “I do.”

 

Two days later Vex was in her study, pouring over books in silence when Opash spoke for the first time in days.

“There,” he hissed.

“What?” She shook her head, trying to focus.

“That town to the east, start there.”

“I don’t—”

“It has always been a bandit town, it will always be a bandit town. Until you go there. You will take them, you will take the entire town. We must begin making moves, Vex’ahlia. If you wish to stop evils coming to destroy this world you must begin following my research instead of reading it.”

Vex looked at the map before her, her eyes locked onto the little place he mentioned. “You want me to—I can’t. They’re innocent.”

“They’re murders! Thieves! They are the rats of the world! You said you needed my power, well this is the price. The town or the world?”

The words hung in the air even though they were not spoken aloud. She didn’t respond, she knew he would not answer. Instead she closed her eyes and picked up the small ring Percy had helped her enchant with the spell to hide them. It had taken many days and a lot of energy but it worked and that was the most important thing.

She would take the town. She would take the souls that resided within it. She would do what it took, that was her vow. Whatever it took.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Maybe not the most interesting chapter but I wanted to talk a little about my new favorite boy. Have no worry though, this is still a Perc'ahlia story, but I just wanted to hopefully make you interested in the other characters before we really got going into the darker more actiony side. We'll probably talk a little more about Trystan, when the other characters come into play they'll have their little bits too, but for the most part I'll be focusing on my favorite power couple so if you're worried about that try not to?  
> Uh anyways, hope you guys are liking it. I'm liking it. Let me know what you think or kudos or let your friends know or something? Thanks for sticking with me


	5. Moving Forward

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's been a little while! I meant to have this up days ago by my computer...Bertha has been having some issues and almost quit entirely but we got her back up and running but there were four days where she wasn't cooperating. But it's here now? Also I've noticed this fic seems to be my late night fic. So. There's that.  
> The last episode was beautiful and Critical Role has been so much to me in such a short time and I'm so glad I got to be a part of it. (I'm also very excited for Tal's one shot)  
> And final note. You guys. On one hand I am so sorry because every day...this fic seems to grow. There is more added to it. Like. The Hotis thing wasn't supposed to be in here, but I was thinking about how close that whole thing was and now they're down Percy and Vex who had big parts, even outside of battle that contract was a really big deal. And like, I was thinking about it and without those two things would have been very different and I wanted to show that. But I did bring Pike in to try and help balance them a little more. But this is an official apology because I keep finding more I want to do with this and it feels like it's just growing and if that's not what you came here for I am so sorry. On the other hand I have some upcoming parts that I am very very excited for. I hope I can live up to my own expectations.

Vex stood on a hill a little ways away from the town. It hadn’t been difficult. It was just bandits. She was reminded of her early days when bandits had been a real issue, when they had made her stop, count their numbers, and evaluate if it was worth it. How much coin were they getting to wipe them out? How likely was she to die? When it was just her and Vax, before she had met the others, it had been even harder. But now…now it was different.

An entire town of bandits wasn’t difficult to wipe out, now keeping them alive was the hard part. Avoiding hurting the people who weren’t bandits but who lived in the town because bandits drank and bought things and people were willing to risk rowdy bandits if it meant they could put food on the table. Now she wasn’t worried if the money was good enough, now it was about if their souls would save the world and if it was worth the personal toll on her soul.

They had taken the town though. With such swiftness and ease that is shocked Vex, it didn’t surprise Percy though. And now they stood side by side on the hill while fires burned below. Trystan and Annik were rounding people up, putting out fires, and just handling the aftermath in general. She had to get away and of course Percy joined her.

Their faces seemed to glow as the faint, flickering light from the fires below and Percy’s hair reflected some of the orange light. Vex just stared down below though, horror weighing down her gut.

“There were innocents,” she whispered.

“There are very few innocents in the world,” Percy said gravely. He had known from the beginning that this was not work that suited Vex. She was good. She was light and hope, she always had been. If someone had told him Pelor himself chose her as his champion he wouldn’t have been surprised. He had known this would be hard for her, he hadn’t known how hard it would be for him to watch her go through it.

“There are people down there who don’t deserve this,” she replied instead.

He nodded. “You can still change that.”

She closed her eyes, swallowing down the tears she wanted to let out. “We should go down there before the other two get restless.”

They walked down quietly and into the town square. Most of the fires were put out and the ones that still glowed were faint and mostly just embers. The silence that filled the air was thick and heavy and Vex believed she could almost taste it.

Percy felt calmer now. In the middle of it all…he knew Orthax was gone. He knew it. Of course there were moments he feared the creature still lived inside him, but deep down he knew. But when the fighting had been going on he had felt a shadow of what he felt when Orthax raged below his skin. And Vex looked at him in the middle of it all and he knew without looking there were wisps of purple smoke that rose from his shoulders. And afterwards Vex had still tried to talk to him, to see how he felt. In everything she was feeling she still was concerned for him.

It was just another moment that Percy added to the proof that Vex was a golden light in his life. Though now it was hard to see. She stood in front of a crowd of people on their knees, many bloodied, some with arrows still sticking from them. There was a small pile off to the side of unconscious bandits with their hands tied behind their backs in case they woke. She didn’t look like the force of good he knew, even if she would never have described herself. But he knew that was still her heart, even if she couldn’t show it now.

“Trystan,” her voice was light, deceivingly so for someone going through an internal battle. “I want all of the ones wearing red to be tied and put with the unconscious. Anyone who looks like a bandit will stay. The rest I want released and pointed to the nearest town.”

Trystan frowned, his forehead creased, and he shook his head, “Vex’ahlia—” she gave him a look. They had discussed this. She and Percy were not to be named if they could avoid it. “My lady,” he corrected himself and she nodded, “why let them go? Don’t we need them?”

“We came for bandits, not for children and tavern keepers. Find which ones we don’t need and let them go. I’ll be quite cross if you keep any who don’t deserve this. We’re saving the world, Trystan, it helps if we make sure there are people worth saving.”

He nodded stiffly and began making his way through the crowd, tapping some and sending them off as he did. Annik stood to the side, his arms crossed over his chest as he watched with a bored look. Vex watched two children get pointed in another direction. No parents followed but she heard a voice shout for them to be let up to go with their children. Trystan’s hand came back and came down with a sharp sound and there was silence. Vex turned away.

She wondered for a moment if those children would find her in a few years. If they would come looking for their vengeance, for justice. She wouldn’t blame them, she would have done the same. Hell, she did in a way. Watching Thordak fall had been a moment of pure satisfaction. And should they find her in later years she would be quite proud. At least it meant she had given them a world in which they could do that instead of one where they had more pressing concerns, if they survived at all.

“Vex,” Percy whispered quietly and she looked over at him. His hands were clasped behind his back and he was looking out over the crowd with an almost disinterested look. He looked, on one hand, cold and distant. On the other he was handsome and strong and most of all he was the man she loved dearly. “Let those two handle this part, it’s why we brought them on, isn’t it?”

In that moment he reminded her so clearly of Sylas it almost scared her. So willing to do whatever she asked, so ready to destroy everything for her, so in love with her, and he looked so refined at the same time. So regal and lordly and dangerous and in love. And…

 _And I would break the world for him_ , she realized suddenly. If something had happened to Percy, her Percy, she would destroy it all without a second thought. To get him back she would bring it to ruins. It was a terrifying thought, one that unsettled her deeply, which seemed to fit with the mood of the day. She shook the knowledge away and said, “Yes, of course. Annik, start bringing them to me one by one, please. We need to begin…harvesting them.”

Vex and Percy set up shop in a now empty building and waited for Annik to bring them the first one. He was exactly the kind of person she needed to see first, to commit to this path. He was angry, he shouted slurs and names even other bandits shied away from, he tried to head-butt Annik who elbowed him in the ribs. When the tiefling knocked the man to his knees he spat at Vex’s feet and threatened to kill everyone she’d ever cared about.

It made it much easier to do what she had to do.

The process of capturing souls is not exactly hard, anyone with some experience in magic and the right mentor to show them how could do it. But it was tedious and long and more than anything it took a toll on Vex’s heart.

They stayed in town for two days pulling souls into geodes and small gemstones they had gathered. Nothing too terribly valuable like diamonds which could be used for many other things, just something to hold the souls without deterioration. And then on the third day Trystan burned the bodies and then went back to their hideout.

For a while she and Percy worked on the souls. They discovered a way to store powerful spells in some of the stones. Sometimes they shattered and were lost, but if the soul was strong enough to handle it all one had to do was smash the stone on the ground for the spell to happen. And one time they brought a soul back. Almost back. They found a body and together they worked the soul into it. But it was wrong and they had to…take care of it. They decided to put that project to the side and work on it later. Vex wanted to find a way to bring people back but whatever they were doing now wasn’t working.

Percy had never been fond of magic, it didn’t have an explanation or a way that it worked, it just was. Opash’s work wasn’t magic so much as science aided by magic, which may have been why he had some interest in it. It also helped that he wasn’t letting Vex get swallowed by this alone.

 

A tall, thin man with an unkempt black beard stood over a desk with a huge tome open on it. “Without a phylactery,” he mumbled and a twisted giggle sounded from his mouth but it was an unnatural sound that she couldn’t say came from any man. “Eternal life, unimaginable power, and all without a phylactery.”

Vex’s head felt like lead, the world around her seemed fuzzy at the edges and she wasn’t sure how she got here.

The figure looked over at her. “The Ever-Fed. You must find him. You must take his secrets, it is the only way. Your power will rival a god’s, you will be able to change the course of the world. Find Guuthal and you can do it all.”

Opash faded and new images came to Vex, but when she woke she had no memory of them. She only knew there had been more.

The dream was taxing on her though. She could not leave her room for an entire day. Percy brought her meals and took care of her and when she finally drifted back to sleep he wiped the sweat from her forehead and moved to the desk in the room. He pulled out a piece of parchment and dipped his quill in the ink. And then he began to write.

_To the members of Vox Machina,_

_Vex and I are safe. We were not taken, we were not killed, the book was not stolen by any unsavory people. We took the book and are currently looking for a way to handle the spinning ball of death and potential rise of Vecna._

_But this is not why I am sending you this letter. I want you to know that Vex is safe, that she is doing everything for a good reason and to keep you all safe. We have kept you from scrying on us for your safety and I must ask you not to seek us out, though I know how likely you are to ignore me._

_Vax, I swear I am keeping her safe. I am doing everything in my power to protect her._

_Until the next time we meet,_

_-Percival Fredrickstein Von Musel Klossowski de Rolo III_

He paused for a moment, his pen hovered over the page and a bead of ink dropped onto the parchment below his name. Beside it he added; _Your friend, Percy._

He sealed the letter and wrote a list of very specific instructions and found Trystan writing in his journal. “Trystan,” Percy straightened himself and lifted his chin. The boy wanted to see him as a higher up and Percy could certainly provide it. Underneath that jackass reason though it helped separate the person he needed to be now to the person he was.

_I’d like to live long enough to be someone else._

He shook the thought off. It would need to wait. This was too important for personal goals.

Trystan looked up and immediately jumped to his feet. “Yes? Do you need me? Is Lady Vex’a—”

Percy waved a hand to silence him, “She’s fine. I need something else from you. This letter must be delivered but our location cannot be revealed. I would do it myself but if someone were to trace our steps back and ask who handed the letter off then we might find ourselves in deep water.” Percy pressed the letter in his hand and held the sheet of instructions up, “I have written down _exactly_ what I want you to do, do you understand?”

Trystan frowned, “You want me to deliver a letter?”

“I know, not exactly what you imagined your life to be like, but yes. This letter is very important but they cannot know where we are. So I want you to take this letter, go west for about a fortnight, and go into the city. I’ve also included a map on how to get there, it should be an easy enough journey to make. I would give you somewhere closer but it is too close to home. I want you to use a fake name wherever you go. And follow these instructions exactly on how it’s sent.” It included double backs and travel through other cities and it would finally end in a trip from a rookery where the letter would be tied to the leg of a bird and set to Whitestone. Near impossible to trace back to this cave.

It took some convincing but Trystan eventually set out west and Percy went back to Vex’s side and cared for her while she slept restlessly.

And when she recovered and found Trystan missing Percy had to explain himself.

“You sent a letter?” Her voice was high and angry and Percy just took it.

“Yes. I did. I didn’t tell them where to find us and I gave Trystan very specific instructions to keep them from finding us. I didn’t tell them what we were doing or what our plans were, only that we were safe and trying to do the right thing.”

“Percy,” she sounded like the wind had been knocked out of her, “Percy why?” She had cried so much and she felt like she was simply out of tears but a few still found their way to her eyes but didn’t quite spill over.

“Because they will always be looking for us, even though they thought we were dead they were looking for us. When none of them could scry on us I’m sure they all believed we had been killed, either by going after the thief of the book or that we were taken with it. But they would refuse to believe it and would give up everything to find us. At least this way they know we are safe and that we are handling ourselves, and maybe, just maybe, they’ll get back on track too.” She didn’t say anything, just crossed her arms over her chest and looked away. “If Vax and Keyleth disappeared in the night with a dangerous book without any kind of note and you couldn’t scry on them, would you ever stop looking until you found them? Until you either saved your brother or could bury him?”

She bit her lip and a shaky breath escaped her lips. “I just…I miss them so much. And I think talking to them would break me.”

He closed the small space between them and wrapped his arms around her and pulled her to his chest. “That’s why I didn’t tell you. Because you would want tell them everything and you wouldn’t know what to do. If you want to go back I’ll go with you, I’ll take you back to Emon today if you want. But I want it to be a choice you make based on what you feel you should do, not because I asked you to write a letter to them and you felt like you couldn’t do this anymore.” He kissed the top of her head and she hugged him back.

“I need to follow this through,” she said into his shoulder and sniffled, “I have to do this.”

“I know.”

They didn’t say much else after that, there wasn’t much else to say. What could Percy say that she didn’t already know? He missed them too? They would always look for her? That they would go back once all this was over? That if Vex wanted to run away he would go with her, damn the world? And what could Vex say that Percy didn’t know? That she missed them so much it burned but this was bigger than her family? That she was scared? That she was lost? That he was the only thing she could rely on right now? He would have laughed at that one, but it was true. She felt like she was falling, that the floor had dropped out from under her and she had no means of flight, but Percy was there and he was reaching out to catch her. In a new life with terrifying ideas and the unknown and nothing familiar around her there was Percy.

But that is something for another time, because in this moment they were silent and still.

 

Trystan had returned and the letter was assumed to be delivered by now and it had been a while since they ventured into town. Annik drew too much attention and Vex gave Trystan some busy work on the souls to do while she and Percy took some much needed time alone. They went to the city to pick up rumors and necessities. Cities are good for trade and work and that sort of thing but they’re best at learning what’s happening in the world.

It was in a tavern, because with ale and food and music there would of course be talk, that Vex and Percy found out.

“Barely alive. Covered in blood, they were holding a friend of theirs, dead. A cleric too. They had to take her down to her temple and find someone to help her. It’s amazing they made it out at all.” They hadn’t been listening at first, there was a lot to listen to here and the music was loud. They couldn’t even hear the storyteller until they had milled closer.

Percy and Vex looked at each other and then settled into seats at a nearby table. Percy’s hood was up, just to try and keep a little attention off of them, and it was pouring rain outside so most people were doing the same.

“You’re telling me some band of idiots escaped The Nine Hells?” The second voice scoffed and the chair creaked under him as he shifted, “Bullshit.”

“It’s the truth. You don’t know ‘em, they’re from across the sea, a whole other continent, but the things they’ve done,” the first man whistled lowly. “Dragons. The ones that were causing all sorts of problems over there? This is the group that took care of them. And apparently there was this city run by a whole order of vampires and they had a huge hoard of undead. And they just cleared them out and took the city back. I even heard someone say once that Nostoc Greyspine himself owned them his life. A trip to The Nine Hells is just another job to them.”

“Oh yeah?” The second man still didn’t seem to believe what he was hearing, which was understandable because most of it was widely exaggerated. “And what kind of job was it?”

“They were going after some beast down there, one who was hunting them.” His voice dropped, “But that place, that place isn’t right. And they got thrown into the prison there. And you can’t get out of that place easily. You can’t get out of it at all.”

“Did they kill their monster?”

“No, that’s the thing. They _ran_ and still one of them died. They brought her back though, they said the light of Sarenrae herself shone down on her and brought her back, but they did it all for nothing. Can you imagine dying and waking up to hear your friends say ‘Shit, I guess we shouldn’t have done that. Wasn’t worth the trouble.’? I mean, my brother is from Vasselheim, every letter he sends me has some new thing these guys are doing, and then they show up in front of him on his way home bleeding out? They were heroes! But I guess they’ve all got to fall at some point, right?”

Vex stood up and immediately rushed out of the tavern, feeling like she was going to throw up right there. Percy followed close behind, aware of all the eyes on the two of them as they ran out.

Vex did throw up on the cobblestone street in front of the tavern. She was not the first who had and she was not the last, but it wasn’t due to the drinks. “Pike,” she whispered hoarsely after she finished. “Pike died. And the others—oh gods Percy we should have been there. They went after Hotis without us and they—”

He rubbed her back and stared off down the street. “They’ll go back too. Hotis has been on our to-do list for a long time. They can’t just leave him to come back for them again.”

Vex stood back up and took a drink of the bottle Percy held out to her to wash her mouth out, one of the expensive drinks he had on him that she didn’t even taste right now. “We have to stop him.”

“Indeed we do.”

Vex chewed her lip and eventually said, “Annik seems like he can get information.”

“I believe it’s time we head back and put our mysterious friend to good use. If anyone can find a rakshasa in The Nine Hells I think he could.”


	6. Vox Machina Runaways (And Friends) Go To Hell

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not dead! Had some writer's block and I've been extra busy, finals and papers and Christmas are all at the same time and I'm??? Everywhere???? Anyways, hope you like the chapter! This was meant to have more happen, this chapter and the next chapter were going to be just one but...things got out of hand and it got longer than I meant it to so I just decided to split them instead of rush it.  
> Thanks for reading! Let me know what you guys are thinking if you want, it not that's cool too, but thanks for sticking with me even though I've been gone for so long.

It was the word rakshasa that pulled a response from Annik. For a full second his body was tense and his lips formed a thin line before he smiled again and he looked almost as relaxed as he usually did. “No.” It was a simple word, no adornments and no reasoning with it. Vex and Percy were sure it had to do with the fear that Hotis was his old mentor, but they also didn’t really care and couldn’t tell him they knew.

Vex pretended not to hear him. “His name is Hotis, somewhere in the Iron City of Dis. Find him.”

“We need a way in and we need it in the next couple of days,” Percy straightened his glasses, “It shouldn’t be hard for you, I mean you won’t need sleep or food so you’ll have much more time to look.”

“I’m not going.” Annik’s dark eyes flashed with an intensity they were unused to from him. He wasn’t the kind to get fired up over much.

_He dares say no to you?_

Vex nodded slowly, like she was thinking. “You are.”

_You are better than him. Better than all of them. Your word, your wishes, they should be followed. Especially something so important to you._

“Because I’m telling you to. Because finding and killing this thing is important to me.”

_They should follow you without question. They should understand their place in this arrangement. This is your brother, they should stop wasting your time._

Vex grabbed his bicep and said firmly, “Find him and come back to me with your information.”

Percy watched Vex quietly. She was casting a spell, he could see it in the slow blink of Annik’s eyes and the way he seemed to reconsider what she was saying. It wasn’t anything to control him, but it was something to make him give it more thought, to see her in a better light. He was familiar enough with Friends to know.

“I…” Annik sighed and looked away, “Alright. I’ll look into it.” He frowned and Vex could feel his hesitation. “I’ll find him and see if there’s anything we should know about him.”

“Thank you,” Vex meant it. This was important. It was important that she had Annik’s help. This was about her brother and she needed to get this taken care of, to keep them safe. If she had been there in the first place maybe she could have helped them.

“Save it until I get back, maybe I’ll like it so much there I’ll stay for a while.” And then he was wrapped in shadows and was gone.

 

Two days passed. Opash didn’t say anything more about the matter, which was nice because Vex felt quite guilty about what she had done. Percy helped, he explained that it wasn’t really that bad, it wasn’t control or anything, and in the end Vax was more important, but Vex was well aware that Percy’s moral compass wasn’t exactly the straightest. He was a good man, but sometimes it didn’t always show.

At the end of the second day Annik’s voice echoed in her head. “Honey, I’m home.”

“I’m in the library.” She answered back silently and looked over to Percy who was pouring over another book at the desk. “Darling,” she called to him, “Annik will be here in a minute.”

He slowly pulled his eyes from the book and looked at her, “With information?”

“I hope so,” her voice was tight with worry at the idea of what he might say. That there was nothing they could do, that Vax and Pike and the rest of her friends would still be in danger.

“You certainly don’t pick easy jobs, do you?” A smooth voice came from behind her and when she looked to the doorway Annik was leaning against it with his arms crossed over his chest.

“I would if the easy ones caused the most trouble,” Vex motioned for him to take a seat near her.

“Hotis is in the Iron City of Dis alright, recovering in the prison Menitiri.”

“So we break in an—”

“Prison in Hell is a little different than prison here. You don’t get in there but just breaking in. And you don’t just walk around inside it either, everything there will kill you. But, lucky for you, I know where I’m going and I can get us into the Bastion of Flesh where he’s kept, but I can’t get more specific than that. And actually we’re going to need to stop off before going there and pick someone up.”

Vex arched an eyebrow, “Pick someone up?”

The tiefling shrugged, “I mentioned the great work you’re doing for the world to a friend. I said we’ll need some help in there, Mentiri isn’t a walk in the park, there’s a reason these people barely escaped with our lives. And my friend, well they were interested enough to help out.”

Vex looked at Percy, trying to gauge his reaction, but he just waited for her. This was her game. “Alright. Fine. What else?”

Annik’s dark eyes slid over to Percy, then back to Vex. “This group. Vox Machina.” Percy kept his cool but Vex’s mouth twitched. “The rakshasa is looking for them. Specifically two members. Pike Trickfoot, little gnome, apparently has a symbol of Sarenrae around her neck. Scar down her eye. Dangerous little one from what I hear.” Vex swallowed. “The other one is a half elf. Long dark hair. Broody. Goes by _Vax_. Pretty close to your name, isn’t it?”

“Percy, darling,” she smiled prettily at Annik, “why don’t you go on to bed. I’ll be along in a moment, I believe Annik wants to talk for a little.”

Percy hesitated before kissing her temple. “I am a whisper away if you need me,” he said quietly and touched her earring as a reminder. He then stood straight and walked out, saying goodnight to Annik as he left.

Annik crossed his legs and stretched his arms out over the back of his chair. He lounged comfortably, but he didn’t look as smug as he usually did. “Let’s play a game again, Vex’ahlia.”

“Same game as before?” She asked.

He shrugged, “Maybe this time I can make it a little more even. I’ll ask one and you ask one.”

“Must be serious if you’ll play fair,” it was teasing but it fell flat. “Why don’t you start, it’s your game after all.”

“Who is he?”

“Vax’ildan is my twin brother.” She licked her lips and swallowed. “I left him to come here. I didn’t want him getting caught up in all this, he’s a better person than I am…he wouldn’t be able to handle it. I don’t want him to handle it.”

“I’m sorry you had to leave him.”

“Me too. What about you? Do you have a family?”

“I…did. I had a mother, a father, three siblings. They were killed. We lived in the Abyss, it’s a cutthroat place and one day someone decided we didn’t belong there anymore. And they killed my family. The others, are they your family too?”

Vex smiled, her heart aching. “Yes. Not through blood, but they’re as much my family as Vax is. We’ve been through everything together. Vox Machina is made of the very best people in the world and so yes, they are my family. You said your name is Annik, no last name?”

Annik hummed and nodded slowly as he mulled the question over. “Annik is my family name. Demakis is…there is not a word for it that you would understand. It was not given to me. Abyssal tieflings go by the name from their line, the one that gave them their blood in the first place. It is a show of standing. And we oftentimes choose a second name for our family and people close to us to use. I chose Demakis.” Vex opened her mouth to ask why but he shook his head, “One at a time, remember?” Annik leaned forward, very intense looking, “What are we doing with Opash?”

Vex licked her lips and a chill touched the back of her neck. “There is something coming. Something worse than you could ever imagine. And Opash, he has ideas on how to stop it. So we are getting help from him. Why did you choose Demakis?”

He nodded. “The Abyss is not a place for children or for friends, it is something you must learn very quickly there. But I had a friend when I was younger. And one day I went to visit my friend, he lived in an alley near where I lived. And he was dead. I took the only coin he had and his name. It’s common practice to take the name of someone who has fallen, though more often a first kill or something. But I took my friend’s name. Demakis.”

“Dema,” Vex mused quietly.

“No.” His voice was harsh and his eyes were darkened with anger, “I don’t like nicknames. I would prefer we stay professional. Annik is good enough.”

Vex nodded, “Alright. I think I’m done playing though. Be prepared to leave in the morning. And when you see Tristan tonight, let him know too.”

“Of course.” Annik didn’t move but his eyes followed Vex as she stood. “Rakshasas tend to hold a grudge, they’ll keep going after those who wronged them.” Vex didn’t answer, didn’t even turn to look at him. “When we go down there, we can’t leave until he’s dead. Otherwise he’ll keep going after you and your brother.”

“Then let’s make sure we kill him.” And with that, Vex left.

 

“I can’t take us directly to the Nine Hells, Shadow Magic has its limits. I have to travel to or from the Plane of Shadow. So I can take us to the Shadowfell, then to the Nine Hells. We meet my friend, stay the night, recover our strength, and then from the Nine Hells to the Shadowfell and then back to the Nine Hells inside Mentiri. There’s no getting in otherwise unless we do something very stupid.”

“Well I wouldn’t count that out yet,” Percy said in a voice that was so very… _Percy._ Vex felt like it had been ages since she heard it, and it felt so good to listen to him like this, like things were normal again.

Tristan was frowning and his fingers fidgeted at the handle of the blade on his side. “Lady Vex’ahlia, I don’t understand why we’re doing this. This has nothing to do with—”

“Tristan, sometimes things aren’t about Opash.” Vex looked at him with dark, serious eyes. At first Tristan’s eager willingness to do whatever she asked under the idea that Opash had chosen her as some sort of prophet, it had been helpful and she had thought it would be good. But the longer she was around him, saw the deep affect it had on him, the less she liked it. “What we’re doing right now? It’s about being human. Or, well, you know,” she touched her pointed ears sheepishly, “a person. It’s about being more than one single goal. If we take care of Hotis we’re saving people he would try and kill. There are more dangers for the people we are protecting than just Vecna, and more saviors than Opash. You, Tristan, you could help people like this.”

Tristan looked down at the ground, one hand rubbing the handle of his sword and the other rubbing the back of his neck. “Right. Right.” He bit at his lip then looked up at Percy, “If we’re helping people…without Opash’s blessing he won’t be protecting us.” Vex opened her mouth but something stilled her. _Let the boy believe it. Blindness will spur him onward, make him stronger. He will fight harder believing we will not let him die._ She didn’t want to listen to it but found she couldn’t speak against it so she let him continue. “Your sword, Percy. It’s good, but in the Nine Hells…I think you need something better. I have something. I don’t know very much about it though.” He pulled the Bag of Holding from his shoulder and reached inside. He pulled out a sheathed blade with a wolf’s head at the hilt. “I don’t know exactly what it does, I had to—I found it on the body of a—he called himself a Beast Hunter. Said he hunted down the things that go bump in the night around towns. Vampires or something, I don’t know. But I don’t need it, I have something I like very much. But perhaps you will get some use out of it.”

Percy pulled the sword from its sheath, showing a bright silver blade, and he nodded. “Thank you.” He arched an eyebrow as he inspected the blade. “This will do quite nicely I think. But let’s keep the old one around just in case.” Percy handed Tristan his old sword and slid his new one on his belt.

“Alright, alright, very nice. Now are we done? This trip is going to take a lot out of me, I’d like to get on with it,” Annik huffed.

“Of course, we don’t want to keep your friend waiting.” She grabbed his shoulder and Percy’s hand. Tristan wrapped his arms around Percy and Annik’s necks.

Annik’s eyes closed and shadows wrapped around them. There was the faintest feeling of a pull and Vex had to shut her eyes as the world whirled around in front of her, threatening to bring up her breakfast.

There was a sudden stop and their bodies all jerked an inch or so as they stopped travelling. Eyes opened and they looked around. Annik took a deep breath but Vex, for a moment distracted, dropped her hand from his shoulder. Annik quickly stopped his magic, and hissed, “Vex! We’ve got to go!”

“A moment,” she replied.

The sky was pitch black, not a single star above them, and the world around them seemed to have the color sapped from it. Where there was shadow it was a dark black and where there were areas that should have been light there was simply…lighter black. To call it gray felt wrong, there was gray in the places that should have been white, but more than anything it was just vague shades of black.

“Tristan, do you have a light?” Percy asked, curiosity edging into his voice.

“Wait, we have to—” Annik’s tail flicked nervously as he looked around.

“A moment, we can’t go anywhere tonight anyways, remember? We will have to spend the night in the Nine Hells, spending a few minutes here won’t be an issue.” Vex walked up to the tree beside her a laid a hand on its black trunk. It felt normal, it felt like something from home.

There was a flash and then it dulled to a very dim light. Vex turned to look and Tristan held a torch but the light was only a fraction of what it should have been. She frowned and looked to Percy, who looked like he had an explanation on the tip of his tongue for her, but instead it was Annik who spoke.

“Put that out!” He snapped. “Anything for miles can see that light, you’ll get us killed,” he snatched the torch from Tristan’s hand and shadow extinguished the light.

“What do you mean? It was so dim I could barely see it,” Vex asked but she reached for her bow anyways.

“It doesn’t work like that here. It’s dimmer but it carries and the creatures here are very aware of it.” As if to prove his point something screeched from a distance and Annik looked over his shoulder for it. “We should leave. Now. Perhaps next time I will show you more but I will tell you now, this is a dangerous place.”

Vex seemed to shake herself, “Yes, of course. We should go.”

Percy looked like he wanted to stay and explore a little more but he grabbed Vex’s hand again and they got back into position and Annik’s shadows, darker and bigger than before, engulfed them again.

When the shadows faded they were standing in the center of a terrible city made of dark stone buildings and the heat was unbearable, oppressive, immediately sweat beaded on their foreheads, all but Annik whose lips were simply pursed together as he looked about with disdain. “This place smells,” he said with a sigh and took a step back from the group.

Vex looked around and saw no other humans in sight. They had talked about this but Annik assured them that they weren’t exactly uncommon, that it was a trade city and as long as they didn’t give anyone reason they wouldn’t be bothered, but there was still something wrong about it. “Are you sure we don’t need disguises?”

“Just stay close to me and don’t make eye contact with anything.” Annik looked strange in his armor, jade and black dragon scale armor and a thick black cloak over that. Back in their hideout there wasn’t much need for it so she hadn’t gotten to see Annik outside of his more comfortable attire much, but she almost felt like he should have been more like Vax. Like he should have daggers and not a black long sword, his armor should be quiet and light and not scale, his cloak should make him silent but if it did anything it wasn’t that. The shadows deadened the noise of his movement but he was not a man who cared much for stealth. She wasn’t sure if the stark difference from her brother was what she wanted or not, but it was what it was.

Tristan’s hand was gripping the hilt of his blade as he watched a creature weighed down in thick, heavy chains that scraped along the ground. Pink flesh peeked out underneath the chains but he looked more metal than flesh at this point. “This place is dangerous.”

“That it is, and if you draw that sword it will only get more dangerous.” Annik touched Tristan’s shoulder, “He’s just a man at work. Let’s move on, my friend is meeting us at…a tavern of sorts.”

It was impossible not to notice the dark glares that followed Annik with every step. Murder glowed behind them, fingers inched towards weapons, and heads turned as he walked past. The others were barely even noticed, it was like Annik was the only one they cared about on the street. And he barely even seemed to notice. He held his chin high, his eyes gliding over the creatures glaring at him, like everyone around him wasn’t imagining all the ways to kill him. And he never even touched his sword or waggled his fingers.

It was not a tavern by Vex’s standards. Taverns have people, they have music and noise and ale and rooms and little hands of pickpockets and barmaids with the latest gossip. This was a large room with long tables and a few spine devils eating wet, bloody, purple-red meat. The blood and gore pooled into the center of the table and into a hole, likely back into the inventory to be served again.

“More humans, eh?” The large man with a scarred face and matted brown beard was behind the counter said with a throaty chuckle, “Haven’t had so many of my kind in a long time.” He leaned forward and placed his meaty hands on the surface in front of him, his skin began to turn red and a blister showed on his pinky, but his heavily calloused hands seemed used to it by this point. Vex turned and rested against it to look out around the room and it burned into her hands, but she refused to budge. “What do you need?” He smiled with far too many teeth and a look in his eye that made Vex uncomfortable.

“Food and shelter,” Percy said simply as Vex scanned the room, “and if you’ve seen a friend of ours we’d appreciate knowing that as well.”

A man sat at a table with a goblet in his hand and watched with moderate interest. He had dark red skin, he had hair as black as coal that fell past his shoulders and turned gray at the tips, horns that came from his forehead, and two large red wings folded against his back. When he saw Vex looking at him he nodded and lifted his class to her and the faintest trace of a smile crept across his lips.

“Depends on who yer friend is. I can get you rooms, I can get you something to eat, but I’m not so good with faces.” Another sickening toothy grin.

Annik looked very intently at the man behind the counter, “I’ll give you one chance. I’m looking for Ruuva Kenani, said she’d meet us here. You’d know her if you saw her.”

The man scoffed and stepped back, “Yer looking for Ruuva? Ain’t worth keeping that information. She hasn’t come by since the last time I threw her out.”

“Good, then you’ll let us know when she comes in.”

“I’m not letting her back in here, not after—” Vex watched the devil nod and heard the man fall silent and then grumble something about how he’d let them know. The real owner of the bar it seemed. “As for rooms, you can have two of the ones upstairs. The food you want isn’t that easy to come by ‘round here, but I’ve got all you need right here,” and he held up a small piece of a spongy looking stone.

Annik nodded, obviously familiar with it. “How much for everything?”

The man shrugged, “For you? 250.”

“No. See, when you say it’s for me, it’s supposed to make the price go down.” Vex looked back at Annik with a little shock and a lot of newfound respect. “I’ll pay 100 gold and that’s it.”

“No, you see, your kind? Ruuva’s kind? Neither of you belong ‘ere and that makes the price go up.”

“My kind? For a human you certainly have a lot of balls, don’t you?” Annik laughed and nodded, “I’ll give you 150, a fair price.”

The man’s eyes flicked over to the devil and then he sighed, “Alright. Fine. But don’t go bringing more of your kind around, I don’t need people thinking I’m harboring you all or something. And if Ruuva breaks another man’s face here, I’ll kill ‘er this time, you understand?”

“You wouldn’t be the first to try. We’ll take five of those slivers, we won’t be here for long.” Annik smiled in a way that made Vex think he was making fun of the man. The best part was that as irritated as he looked, he still slammed down five of the stones and two black iron keys. “Thank you so much, friend. And please remember your place next time we talk,” Annik gave him a charming smile and took the keys and walked up the stairs.

Vex motioned for Tristan to take the slivers and waited for him to start up the stairs before turning to the man. “You said there had been others here? Who were they?”

He narrowed his eyes, “Didn’t ask. Wasn’t my business.”

Percy pressed a few gold onto the black slab of stone, “Did one of them have antlers?”

He stared at Percy for a long time and didn’t touch the gold. “Yeah. Another one bought twenty of those damned stones.”

“Let me guess,” Vex drawled, trying to feign disinterest or at least irritation, “he had gold hair and very shiny armor?”

“And a large metal man,” he added and then grabbed a disgustingly dirty glass. “You better go on up to your rooms. Unless you want to get something to eat down here,” he nodded to the tables that were slick with blood and the handful of spine devils, two of them now watching Percy and Vex with obvious curiosity and hunger.

Vex looped her arm through Percy’s, “Thank you for all your help,” and led him away towards the stairs. “That was…interesting,” she said as they climbed the stairs.

“They were here,” Percy said quietly.

“Yeah.” She wasn’t sure what else to say about it. “And Annik’s haggling skills, I couldn’t have done better myself.”

“I will say, sometimes I miss being around nobility. They do know how to get what they want.” He gave her a sly glance and a light smirk, “It’s one of the infinite reasons why I love you.”

“Flatterer. Not that I want you to stop.”

“I do.” Annik was standing in the doorway of one of the rooms. “Come inside, we’ve got to talk.”

Tristan shut the door behind him and Annik went to the window, opened it, and leaned out to look at the alley below. “The man down there, the devil who really owns this place. Don’t talk to him alone. Especially you,” he pointedly looked over his shoulder at Percy. “I don’t need to be a cleric or anything to know you’ve been touched by stupid, dark deals. And besides,” he looked back to the alley, “having me around would get you a much better deal. Ah, there.” He waved his hand out the window and took a step back.

In seconds there were two gloved hands on the windowsill and a woman pulled herself effortlessly into the room. She had dark gray skin, short red hair that stuck up in far too many directions for it to be intentional, and pointed ears. “Nice to see you again, Annik. Are these your friends?” She asked and turned to look at them with a bright smile. She held her hand out to Vex, “I’m Ruuva.”


	7. Powerplays and Disguises

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry I took so long! This chapter was going to have a fight scene in it but it just didn't work and I figured I'd spent long enough working on it and should just post it already. I'm excited for the next chapter and I hope you guys are too.

Vex slowly took Ruuva’s hand and shook it, “Vex’ahlia.”

“Nice to meet you. Didn’t think you’d be a half elf,” Ruuva took her hand back and touched one of her own ears, “It’s a nice surprise to have someone like me around! Well, kind of like me. I’ve been down here a while now, haven’t gotten to see much other than devils, tieflings, and a few awful humans. No offense,” she smiled at Percy.

He smiled and nodded, “None taken. To be fair we aren’t always the friendliest people.”

“Especially not the ones here. Honestly, you’d think they thought they were devils themselves. You know, the other day I saw one—”

Annik cut her off before she kept going, which Vex was grateful for because she couldn’t handle bubbly and fast right now. “Ruuva, you seem to have spent some time in this place. The man downstairs, who is he?”

She frowned, “Nobody good. His name is Ipkesh. He’s got some weight to throw around, not anything super special but people listen for the most part. He tried to hire me to take out his boss, but I am looking forward to getting out of this place and would rather not be held up by another job.” Ruuva looked to Vex again, “That’s what I do. Bounty hunting, assassination, that sort of thing.”

“A difficult job,” Percy said lightly.

“Not a very good job,” Tristan mumbled darkly.

Ruuva glared at him and said, “It is difficult. And I’m very good at it. You only hire me if you’ve failed with someone else and you want to make sure it sticks this time. And, since it seems to be unsettling to some of you,” she finally looked away from Tristan and crossed her arms over her chest, “being the best means you get to be picky. I only kill people who cause more harm than good, but I get to make a profit on it as a bonus. Which is why when Annik told me he’s trying to help save the world it may have peaked my interest.”

“We don’t pay well,” Percy said as a light warning.

“Or at all,” Vex mumbled. She had not exactly been happy with the turn in their finances. They had lost their treasury, they weren’t doing any missions for wealthy people looking to save their town, and when they went to small towns and murdered bandits for souls they rarely pillaged, instead leaving the valuables and gold in the area for the few innocents they let leave.

“How about you pay me after then? We save the world and work it out then. I have plenty to tide me over and I have a good feeling that you’ll lead me to some lovely things I can sell if all else fails. And it’s been a while since I just did something out of the goodness of my heart,” she smiled warmly and let a hand rest over her heart in a similar way to a noblewoman admiring a lovely sight before her.

“She’s a wanted woman in most cities,” Annik said a little smugly and a smirk teased at his lips, “not for the killing, more for the rest. She doesn’t like men looking at her in bars. She likes to hit them.”

“Wouldn’t mind the looking if it was just lookin’,” she snapped back in a familiar way, “I only hit the ones who make their unwelcome desires well known. And it usually isn’t the fighting that makes it hard to stay in a town long, it’s mostly the breaking out of jail and fighting the guards while they escort me to the prison that makes them tell me not to come back.”

“Surprised we aren’t stopping in Mentiri to break you out too.” Annik shut the window again, which unfortunately didn’t shut out any of the heat.

“So you’re really going there? Gods you’re stupid.” She grinned. “I like it. How you getting in?”

“Plane shifting,” Annik leaned against the wall of the room and for a second Vex felt panic rise in her chest, a warning to get off the wall before he got burned on her lips, then she remembered he was a tiefling. His skin was made for this.

“Waste of energy. Speaking as an expert, there are two best ways into a prison. Get arrested—”

“No, I don’t think that’s an option for us,” Percy said slowly.

“—or to go in disguise,” she finished.

“Are you telling us because you have an idea or just because you wanted to tell us we had bad ideas?” Tristan glared down at the half-drow.

“Ipkesh wanted to hire me to take care of his boss. I’m sure he could cut you a deal if you want. Though I’d be careful, everything around here has barbs where you’d think there was skin.”

Percy frowned and said, “That’s…an odd metaphor.”

She nodded very seriously, “Maybe it doesn’t translate as well as I thought. Everything here will fuck you up if you let your guard down.”

“Ah, that one I understand more.”

Ruuva looked to Vex. “Ipkesh might have a way to get you in the door, but it won’t be free. I’d be very careful making a deal with him. But if you just want to be arrested, well it’ll take me about three minutes before we’re being escorted away in manacles.”

Vex and Percy looked at each other with questioning eyes but not really comfortable having this conversation in front of Ruuva.

“My dear,” Annik smiled and threw an arm around her shoulders, “I believe you said you had some business to take care of?”

“Yes, I have to pick up the rest of the payment for my last job.”

“Why don’t you take me with you? I’d love to see that town, I’m afraid I haven’t made enough of an impression already. And Tristan, you should accompany us! The Iron City of Dis is the loveliest place in the Nine Hells, which is mostly because this place is so terrible but it’s still a sight to see.”

Tristan looked to Vex and waited for her to nod before he agreed to go with them. He was clearly unhappy but not willing to go against his prophet’s wishes and so he followed them out the door and left the two alone.

The second they left Vex’s shoulders slumped and she leaned into Percy who embraced her as eagerly as she did him. “Percy…” she pressed her cheek into his shoulder and closed her eyes, “I’m not sure we really thought this through.”

His shoulders moved as he laughed, “No, I don’t believe we did. But that was never our strong suit, was it?”

“No,” she mumbled against him.

He kissed the top of her head and thought for a few moments before he carefully said, “We didn’t come with the strongest plan, but we rarely do. We didn’t come here to do something the right way, we came to do something right.”

She snorted and pulled back to look at him with a warm smile. “That’s such a terrible line and I can’t believe you of all people would say it.”

He grinned back, “I’m not claiming to be a good man, but you’ve made me better. Because while I am not exactly pure of heart, you most definitely are.” She laughed and looked up at him like she was about to say that was an overstatement, but he pressed on. “This is how we save your brother, even if we make some terrible decisions like we are guaranteed to do, we’re making sure Hotis isn’t a threat anymore.”

“What are we going to do? Our entire plan was to just show up in the prison, what are we actually going to do?”

“Well I don’t think getting arrested is how we should go about it. But perhaps that drow was onto something…we keep thinking about breaking in. What if we just walk in?”

Vex pulled away and began chewing her lips as she mulled the thought over in her mind. “This place seems to run on servants and slaves. We probably couldn’t get away with pretending to be buyers, but Annik…”

“He’s a tiefling. An Abyssal tiefling which could either help or get us thrown in jail, but either way we’re where we want to be.”

“What even is the difference? Did you see how everyone was looking at him? And he keeps making jokes about this place being a lower-class kind of place, but it’s like everyone here wants to kill him.”

“Well, the only reason he can really walk around here is because he’s a tiefling. If he was a true Abyssal demon he’d be having a lot more of an issue, even here in the City of Dis. But he’s not a full demon, he’s just got demon blood. In the battle of good and evil it used to be just angels and demons, but the demons got into a tight spot and created Infernal devils to help them. Of course, after the devils saved them they started thinking they should be the real rulers of everything, not the demons from the Abyss. And ever since there’s been this thing between them. So, Annik is both sides of that. A creator and technically a superior, but someone unworthy of his position who they probably think about killing every time they see him.”

Vex snickered, “You know, sometimes he makes me think of you. With his whole noble act.”

Percy smiled back, “Most of the people my family dealt with acted a lot like him. It’s like reliving my childhood all over again.”

“I’m not sure I want to put our faith in someone who might be feared enough or might be hated too much.”

“I’m afraid that’s going to be a situation we run into a lot now.”

Vex stepped away from Percy and crossed her arms over her chest. “So we’re doing this? We’re really going to just add a bounty hunter like her into our already not so trustworthy group of people and just break into this terrible prison and what?”

“And we’ll kill Hotis and then we’ll go back and we’ll work on Opash’s research and we’ll find out what we’re supposed to do next.”

Percy would be lying if he said that he could make sense of what was happening and could see a future that went well. Percy hadn’t seen a future that ended well in years. Percy wasn’t even totally sure any of this was really happening, he could still be lying on the ground in a prison cell. But Vex was his rock, Vex had dragged him out of the hardest moments in his life, Vex was always there when he needed her. Vex was just about everything. Even when she was on the edge of falling apart she would make sure he was doing okay with everything, which he rarely was and she always would help. So even if Percy didn’t believe almost anything he was saying, even if it was all just him trying to make her feel better, it was what she needed right now. And Percy was dedicated to being what Vex needed.

And Vex would be lying if she said she didn’t see where he was coming from or what he was doing, but it did help. It helped a lot.

She moved back to him again, leaning into him and taking comfort in having him close. “So how are we getting in? We have a good disguise, are we literally just walking through the door?” Vex’s hand lay against Percy’s chest. It felt like there had been so little time to just be with him, even less time than there had been before. And now there was Opash so she rarely felt alone with him.

“I think we need someone to vouch for us.”

“The man downstairs?”

Percy nodded, “Ipkesh. I think he might be able to help us in the door.”

“They won’t be back for a little while though, and it’s been a while since we’ve been alone,” Vex arched an eyebrow at him, “and I have to say it is way too hot for all of these clothes.”

Percy was already halfway out of his shoe, his jacket falling off one shoulder, and somehow his glasses were askew and he hadn’t even touched them. And as always his eagerness made Vex laugh and she cupped his face with both her hands, stopping him for just a second, and kissed him like she would have before all of this.

And, for a short time, there was no Opash, there was no search, there was no dangerous situation, they could even pretend the heat in the room was not from being in Hell. For a little while things were normal again.

It did not last.

“Don’t see your kind here often, and when we do they’re usually smart enough to try and disguise themselves.” Ipkesh had a cold smile, like he was trying to be nice and was almost good enough to be believable.

“Cowards, all of them. But not what I’m here to talk about,” Annik was standing behind the chair across from the devil. “This,” he gestured to Vex’ahlia, “is a woman with goals. And you,” he looked back to Ipkesh who was looking at Vex with mild interest, “are a man with connections or money or something that can be helpful, I’m sure.”

“For a price I might be able to help you. What are you in need of?” When he smiled he showed his teeth with canines that ended in unnaturally long, sharp points.

Vex sat across from him and crossed her legs. Percy didn’t try and hide the almost proud smile, Vex looked regal. She had always been a master of the powerplay but it never ceased to amaze him at how well she did it, even now as Vex waved to Tristan to grab Ipkesh’s wine and pour her a glass.

“I want into Mentiri,” she took a sip of the deep red wine and frowned. “Disappointing.” She held it out to Percy who took it. “A glass of the Courage, dear? I believe we still have some left.”

“Of course,” he poured the glass out for her, letting the likely wonderful red wine spill out onto the empty black of the plane Ipkesh had momentarily transported them to. He then pulled out the bottle of Courage and filled her glass again.

Ipkesh watched with an amused look, totally aware of what Vex was doing but nonetheless impressed. “I’m sure you don’t need me to get arrested, but if you want help on the inside…something could be arranged.”

She took the glass and held it between her fingers. “You’re misunderstanding. I don’t want to be arrested. I want in the front door, led to the rakshasa Hotis, and left alone with him.”

Ipkesh laughed and Vex fought against the chill that ran up her spine. “Do you know where you are?”

“You brought us here, I thought you would know.” Vex took a drink from the glass.

“Funny. I can do a lot but you’re asking for more than I can offer.”

Ruuva was cleaning under her fingernails with a knife behind Vex’s chair and without looking up she said, “You still want your boss taken care of?”

“Are you rethinking my offer?” He asked with a curling smile.

“Not me, I don’t sign contracts from devils. But Annik might be able to help.” Ruuva waved her blade in the tiefling’s direction.

“I believe it’s my turn to step in,” Annik winked at Vex and then turned his attention back to Ipkesh. “My name is Annik, descended from the ancient Annikar. His blood runs in my veins still, his name blesses my life still, and it comes with the perks of being one of the most important tieflings in any plane and certainly the most important in this awful place. But back in the Abyss I still have quite a bit of sway. I say the word and your boss disappears. I’ll even give you a second name to disappear if you want, so long as it’s none of my friends. And all I ask is that when I show up at the prison, you tell one of those disgusting bone devils that you told me to go there for what I’m looking for and I will gladly handle the rest.”

Ipkesh tsked and shook his head, “What you are asking me to do and what you are offering are not worth the same. If you get caught I will find myself in Mentiri as well. And not to mention how some of my dear dear friends will look at me after discovering I helped someone, even a tiefling, from the Abyss. I’m afraid I can’t do what you ask.”

Annik nodded slowly, “I see. What if I sweeten the deal. You help us through the front door like I asked, you get your boss and one additional name, and I don’t send my very good friends after you instead. You may be quite powerful here but you’re nothing compared to them. This is the best deal you’re going to get and if I leave without feeling satisfied you’re going to see many more demons in this city than you’ve ever seen and they’re all going to be looking for you.”

Vex wasn’t sure if Annik really had that kind of power, but he looked very convincing when he said it.

Ipkesh drummed his fingers on the table and looked at Annik for a long time. Then looked to Vex. “He drives a hard bargain.”

She shrugged, “I could have done better.”

He chuckled, “Oh?”

“Don’t ask what I would have asked for or you’ll be giving up more than a few friends.”

He sighed and his wings shifted uncomfortably. “Alright. I will accompany you to the door and I will let them know I sent you. What exactly are you going to do?”

“Leave that part to us, darling, don’t worry your pretty little head about it.” Vex stood up and downed the rest of her glass, set it on the table and said, “I think we’re done here.”

“I’m afraid we must sign a—”

“Come now, don’t you trust me?” Annik’s eyes flashed and he smiled with teeth that seemed too long for any tiefling Vex had met.

The devil laughed and stood as well, “I wouldn’t want you to leave unsatisfied. Perhaps we will shake instead?”

“Now that is much more agreeable, isn’t it Lady Vex’ahlia?”

She hummed and held her hand out to Ipkesh. His hand was larger than hers, the skin hard and thick and hot against hers. It was uncomfortable and exactly what she thought shaking hands with a devil would be.

“Tomorrow then?” He asked when they let go.

“Tomorrow,” Vex agreed.

 

Annik slept the entire night after the effort of the day. And then they prepared. They met Ipkesh in the bar and he showed them the way to an entrance where someone he trusted to believe him was working.

“Do not mention them when we get there,” Annik walked beside Ipkesh and the others followed behind with wary eyes. “They are my help, bodyguards and beautiful people to follow me around. They are nothing, not to you, not to the chain devils or bone devils who wander around this place, they are nothing. Don’t even look at them if you can help it, treat them like those damn piles of boiling flesh out on the street. A necessary but unfortunate thing we keep around. Best not to think about it.”

“Interesting, but alright.” People glared at Annik, but Ipkesh was looked at with surprise. It seemed he was not a man who waltzed around the city, or at least not with this kind of crowd.

They walked for an unfortunately long amount of time before they reached their destination.

There was a chain devil that met them at the entrance. A tall, pale man wrapped in grey iron chains with black beady eyes. And when Ipkesh told him to show Annik around, he simply said, “No.”

Ipkesh shook his head, “I’m afraid you owe me too much to say no. And I’ve already told my friend here, Annik, that this was the best place to find what he wants.”

“Which is?” The voice sounded like glass scraping along stone.

Annik smiled and stepped forward, “Something _exciting_!” He waggled his fingers in the air and then looked at the rest of them with a well-crafted frown. “These members of my little entourage are very good at what they do, which is nice of course, but they’re boring. Humans and half elves? Even if one is half drow, it’s just nothing special. And Ipkesh here told me if I want something good that you have everything for a price.”

The black gaze slid over to Ipkesh again and it huffed out air like the dying breath of a man in pain. “This makes us even.”

Vex was focused on showing no emotion to the voice or the creature, it was important to keep the look up. Her hand rested on the hilt of the dagger at her waist as she stared down the devil. Her role was bodyguard, protect Annik, make sure Annik gets what he wants. She had never been the best actor in the group but she could do this at the very least.

Ipkesh waved his hand, “Yes, yes, we’re even. Just take him in, find him something new to take home. Quietly if you could.”

The chain devil growled something unintelligible and turned around and started walking into the prison, its chains dragging along behind it. Annik began following and the others warily went after.

“This one will take you,” its scratchy voice let out and one ugly hand with a hook covered in dried blood pointed to a bone devil down the hall.

They followed in silence for a while until it spoke. “What are you looking for? We house a number of interesting ones to purchase.”

Percy’s eyes slid over to Vex who was trying her best not to grind her teeth as they talked. He wished he could say something or touch her hand at the very least, but anything might have tipped them off. So he just watched with guarded eyes and pretended that he was making sure Annik was safe.

“I want something new. Nothing so human looking as these ones. They’re skilled and a few of them are quite pretty, but after a while one just tires of them. I want something different. What do you suggest?” Annik looked around carelessly, a wide smile that flashed his white teeth, and if someone had been looking for him they would have decided the way he walked so openly and without any care to his wellbeing would make him a good target. Instead he completely relied on the others to make sure he didn’t die, which sold the act of course but it was a little more than stressful for everyone else.

“Most of them are harder to control,” it hissed.

“The two half elves were quite difficult to break,” Annik smiled at Vex and then at Ruuva but it was a false warmth. “But in the end they all break.” He looked back to the bone devil, “Isn’t that where the fun comes from anyways? Molding them into something worthwhile? But you’re right, in the end these ones are easy. Like dogs. And I’m looking for a real challenge now.”

It grunted in agreement. “We have a few things you might want. Celestial blooded ones if you want.”

“No, still very human in the end.”

“Bird men?”

“I’m not a fan of beaks. Perhaps claws?”

“We _had_ a werebear, but…something happened.”

“That would have been quite interesting. Ah, I know. A rakshasa is exactly what I need to see.”

The bone devil turned its face to look at Annik with its empty eye holes, “That is not a creature for you to claim.”

Annik rolled his eyes. “No, I’m not looking to claim a rakshasa. I’m looking to talk to one.”

It just stood in the hall looking at Annik for a long time without leading them anywhere. “You’re looking for a rakshasa?”

“I am. And I expect you to lead me to it.”

“No.”

Annik’s lip lifted into a snarl and he said, “You will. An almost god is closer to me than you are. And I am tired of talking to something like you, I will talk to someone on my level.”

The bone devil’s teeth snapped, “You don’t speak to me like that you—”

Percy pressed the barrel of his gun to the skull and there was a click as he readied it to fire. “I wouldn’t say anything else if I were you.”

Vex’s voice was calm when she said, “My master wishes to speak to someone better. If you don’t take him, we’ll kill you and find someone who will.”

As the bone devil seemed to weigh its options Tristan stepped forward, subtly putting his body in front of most of Vex, and just looked generally intimidating and large. Which likely helped in the decision making.

“Oh dear,” Annik put his hand in front of his mouth in mock shock, “it seems you’ve upset my friends. Well,” Annik dropped his hand and shrugged, “friends is a little much. My dogs is a better description, isn’t it? I want to speak to someone important, someone better than you. So, if you want to keep your head, take me to someone more worth my time.”

There was a quiet sound of bone clacking against bone as it trembled slightly, “There’s only one rakshasa here and it isn’t talking anytime soon. It is still in the process of reforming, it will be months at least before it can speak to you.”

Annik smiled and waved Percy off. “You’ll be amazed at what I can do. They beauty of Shadow Magic is that I don’t need words or even consciousness to talk to someone.” It was a half truth, but one the bone devil bought as it slunk through the halls with them into the maze of the prison.

When it led them to the room where they kept the ugly, pulsing egg with the regenerating rakshasa Hotis, Ruuva killed the bone devil in one strike with a quiet, ancient song that Vex recognized as Undercommon, as she swung her blade through the air and drove it deep into the devil.

And an egg with no real defenses wasn’t difficult to kill either, and with no real alarms sounded on their way in there was no issue in ending Hotis for good this time. And when the deed was done they formed a circle again and Annik wrapped them in shadows and brought them to the Shadowfell, which he quickly brought them out of. Vex, while still curious, was grateful for how quickly they left that dark place. When she looked out in the distance she saw a ridged skyline that looked like a city and a tower that stuck up over it that made her uneasy.

And then they were home again. And as Vex readied for bed she spoke to Percy who was sitting at the desk, sketching some designs, “We should send another letter saying Hotis will no longer be a problem.”

“I agree. Otherwise they’ll go back looking for him,” Percy stretched his arms up over his head before he stood. “Though if we send another letter they might get a lead on how to find us.”

 _Let them find this place, it is time we moved on._ It had felt like a long time since Opash’s voice sank into her like that and it sent a chill up her spine.

“Don’t worry about it. I believe that we’re almost done here, and then we can leave.”

Percy stood and walked over to her. He settled his hands on her hips and cocked his head to the side, “Where to next?”

_It is time we went to Marquet._


	8. Weekend Vacations and Crime Lords

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I have been gone a really long time. I took advantage of the new campaign to take a step back from fanfic since I had less ideas I wanted to do right away and instead started putting more work back into my professional writing. Fun fact I'm actually a published author through an LGBT publishing company. I know you probably don't want to hear me rant about it, so you can skip down to the story if you want to, just know updates will be irregular but I'm not giving up this story because I enjoy it and have ideas for it.  
> I have two out of three books for the trilogy I am publishing already out. The last book I have...spent a long time being displeased with. I took up fanfic because I could tell I wasn't up to a standard I wanted to be at, I'm still not, but I do feel more comfortable writing ideas and scenes I wouldn't have before and I feel more creative because of it and I think my style has really improved when I'm trying to be at my best consistently. Anyways, what I'm trying to say is I got a lot out of writing fanfic and now I'm trying to put that back to use in my professional and original work again. I don't think I will love this last book because I've already had some feelings about it and how it isn't the series I would right today, but the next two projects I'm neck deep in worldbuilding for I think will really be something I can be proud of and a big reason is because of my intense focus on fanfic last year. So thank you for all your support in that and I'm sorry I'm so terrible at replying to comments (I never know what to say, I just smile and read them over whenever I've had a bad day but I can't think of anything interesting when I want to say thank you) but thank you again for giving me a place to grow and feel comfortable writing again. It's been two and a half years since I opened the document for that book and it's nice to get back into it. I'll still be doing fanfic, just hopefully I'll be doing more of my original stuff.  
> Thank you. It sounds silly but I mean it.

They were in Marquet for an entire month before they went to Ank Harel again, and when they did go they wore a lot of layers and made their trips brief. While Vex and Percy were not very well known this far away from Tal’Dorei, specifically Emon and Whitestone, Percy’s hair stuck out too much for their liking. So for the next few months they kept their trips to a minimum, usually sending Tristan instead. He was human, unknown in the area, and could pass through unnoticed. Annik and Ruuva occasionally ventured into the city, but only in the dark when they needed information or to procure items that may not be found in the market.

“The man is like a ghost,” Ruuva had her feet kicked up on the table and her hands were clasped behind her head. She was talking about their last little venture because Vex had asked about him again.

It had become apparent within the first month that the city’s underworld was run by three people, more or less, and they were trying to get ahold of the one with the most promise. He dealt in knock off furniture, which was nothing particularly impressive, but he was new to the crime scene and had risen to power with insane speed. Despite how quickly and how, in comparison to the others, sloppily he had grown Ruuva and Annik couldn’t seem to get a hold of him. Vex wanted some things that she didn’t need getting out, she wanted to go to the source. If word got around they were looking for ancient books on lichdom, Vecna, Guuthal, and harvesting souls it wouldn’t look good. Neither would asking for materials related to harvesting souls. And it seemed like if you wanted something to stay hidden you went to the man who couldn’t be found.

It was becoming frustrating though.

Percy was bent over the high table with a special pair of glasses he had developed to magnify what he was looking at. He set the stone he was working on aside in the “fractured” category. Fine for holding very low-level spells or for a short adrenaline rush, but nothing more. They were dangerous, unstable, they’d had a few too many issues with ones like that.

He picked up another and began to look it over. “How are you supposed to take someone seriously if you’re not even sure they exist?” Percy muttered darkly. “It may not even be one person, it could be a bunch of them. It could be five of them or even twenty and we have no idea.” Percy did not like not knowing. He was not good at that.

“We did find out one thing. He goes by Aes Adan,” Ruuva added but didn’t seem very invested in it.

“That’s something I suppose,” Percy said without much feeling.

“What do you think, dear? Should we go looking?” Vex was reading from a thin black book that had been in Opash’s library when they arrived in the center of the maze of catacombs that Opash had created.

Her voice calmed Percy again. The slight lilt to it, the teasing and loving tone that said she wanted to go, the lightness that made it seem like they weren’t looking for a crime lord to help them in their terrible deeds but like they were looking for a good dining room table and just hadn’t found it yet. “It has been a while since we got out. Might be nice to spend some time together,” Percy set the stone down and straightened up, put his hands on his hips, and arched his back as he tried to stretch it out.

“A date?” Vex looked up from her book with a sly look in her eyes.

“Do you remember that hookah place we went to?” Percy answered indirectly.

“I do. But if we’re going to places we’ve already been,” she stood up, set her book aside, and walked over to Percy. She ran her fingers through his hair and continued, “this might be a little too noticeable.”

“A fair point,” he kissed the palm of her hand.

“If you’re done,” Annik drawled from the doorway, “I’ve got some information on that village you were asking about. Looks like our kind of place. I assume you’ll want Tristan and I to get it ready and you’ll be there in a few days?”

Vex looked over her shoulder at him with a grin, “Not quite yet. Stay here, just in case, I have a date and I don’t know when I’ll be back.”

Annik rolled his eyes but there was a hint of a smile behind it and he walked off to find something else to do.

“You guys need a disguise, right?” Ruuva asked as they cleaned up the lab.

“Probably just Percy, he’s more recognizable,” Vex answered.

“Well uh, I’m used to having to go into towns looking a little different, so I picked this up a while ago.” She held up a black wool flat cap, which looked like a hat Percy would wear out on a date. “Just make sure you bring it back, yeah?”

Percy turned it over in his hands, “To cover my hair?”

Ruuva rolled her eyes, “Not exactly. It’s a Hat of Disguise, it doesn’t even have to look like you’re wearing it.”

Percy grinned, “We had one of these not long ago.” Then his eyes darkened, “Someone stole it from us.”

Vex touched his arm lightly, “To be fair we took a lot of stuff with us too.”

He huffed and put the hat on.

 

Vex looked over at him again as they walked around the market their second day in the city. They had bought some fruit, talked to a few people, they had stayed the night in an ostentatious place with the softest bed Vex had slept in in months. Percy was terrible in a city though, constantly losing his sense of direction, missing obvious signs and people, but he was almost excited. It was good to see him laughing again. Though he didn’t look like her Percy, not really.

Almost everything was exactly the same except for his hair which was brown. He said it was the color his hair used to be before the Briarwoods. He didn’t say it with longing or bitterness, it was just a simple fact. But looking at him like this didn’t seem right. Chestnut hair was the boy he used to be. The man who walked beside her, with wide blue eyes as he tried to take the city in, the boy with scars that littered his body, with a darkness that still lingered around him, the man Vex had fallen in love with, the man Vex would break the world for (the realization of that still sent a chill down her spine, that she and Delilah may not be so different), his hair was not brown. Percy was still handsome, his jaw was the same sharp line as before, his eyes the same blue that lit up when he could sense something new within a mile of him, but the more Vex looked at this brown-haired Percy the more she decided she liked _her_ Percy better. She had a feeling that if she had met brown haired Percy they would not have gotten along very well.

This thought was cut short (compared to most of her thoughts about Percy at least, she could ramble about him for ages in her thoughts) by a small boy in tattered clothes staring up at them with narrowed eyes and a frown.

Vex smiled at the boy, “Hello there, can we help you?”

Percy leaned toward Vex and she felt his breath against her ear as he whispered, “Hold onto your purse, dear.”

She frowned at him as if to say, _How dare you assume I would take my hand off it to begin with_. Then she looked back to the boy and waited.

“Where you from?” He must have been around nine or ten, he was missing a tooth and there was not a single hair on his chin. He was small, thin, his hair covered his eyes if he didn’t push it away and his clothes were dusty with holes in them. It was an uncomfortable sight, this boy whose eyes were dark and harsh, who demanded answers in a sharp, high voice that belonged in a game and not stopping adults on the street. The boy wore no shoes, his hair was uneven, his fingernails had dirt caked underneath them, and a scar carved through his bottom lip to his chin. It was obvious at a glance the boy had not slept under a roof in a very long time.

Percy and Vex looked at each other then back to the boy. “Wildmount,” Vex answered confidently. “Do you need help? A few coins to get you some food and a place to stay?” She was already reaching for her coin purse. She would have offered to take the boy home but technically there were still skeletons that roamed the catacombs looking for people Vex hadn’t given the okay to and that didn’t seem like the best place to bring a child.

“Don’t need it. Aes Adan will pay me when I find who he’s looking for.” Percy was surprised by this answer. He was no expert on Marquesian practices and culture, but for someone in such poverty as this to turn down coin…it baffled him. It felt suspicious, but Vex was already pressing forward.

“Who is he looking for?” She asked.

The child pointed to Vex’s hair, “Half elf with blue feathers.” Then he looked at Percy, “And a human with white hair.” He pursed his lips and frowned, obviously dissatisfied with Percy’s hair as well. “He said they’re heroes from Tal’Dorei. He wants to talk to them.”

Vex could see the only reason the child hadn’t written them off completely was her feathers, but the longer he looked at Percy’s hair the more he seemed to doubt them, so she had to speak quickly. “We know them. The people you’re looking for.”

The boy slowly looked back to her and crossed his arms over his chest. “Are you sure?”

“They’re from Vox Machina, Emon or Whitestone depending on who you ask,” Vex said as if the child would understand it was proof.

“I have to take them to Aes Adan,” he said again.

“Of course. We just have to go tell them. Tell us where to go and we’ll see him tomorrow.”

The kid shook his head. “He only pays me if I bring them.”

“Okay, well what if we meet you back here tomorrow? I—you can tell him I’m Vex’ahlia, the half elf with the feathers. I just have to get the human and some of my other friends, that’s all.” Vex couldn’t say it in words, but she felt it in her bones. She needed to see this Aes Adan. And Percy agreed, though perhaps more subtly.

“You’re going to bring others?” Vex couldn’t read the kid to tell if that was what he wanted or not. “Tomorrow. Here at noon.” He paused then said, “I would not do anything in an attempt to hurt or turn against Aes Adan. His reach is long and I am afraid there are not many places you could go where he would not find you. He is hoping to help you, I would remember that when you are gathering you friends.” And then the boy turned and rushed off, leaving Vex and Percy with an uncomfortable weight in their gut. They had never met a child who spoke like that. They weren’t sure if that said more about the child or Aes Adan.

 

Vex and Percy didn’t stay in the city much longer after that. They entered a few book stores, picked up a few small items, but were eager to get back to their hideout and regroup.

When they told the other three there were…mixed responses.

Ruuva smiled and nodded, “Shit, this is exactly what we wanted. Better than what we wanted, he already wants to help us, no convincing involved. This is perfect.”

Tristan was more hesitant and brought up one of Vex’s big concerns. “You said he knew who you guys were? From Vox Machina? And had descriptions of you?”

And Annik surprised Vex when he said, “I don’t like this.” He had always seemed more carefree, it was why he and Ruuva got along so well. They were both of the mindset that if it gets fucked up they’ll find a way to get out of it. “You walk in, spend the night, and the next day someone comes up to you two specifically and says this guy wants to meet up? We’ve been looking for him for months and could barely get his name.”

Which was Percy’s main concern. It was too convenient for a city that big and a man so secretive. But they had already decided on the way home. “We’re going to meet him tomorrow, we’ve been trying to get a meeting for a while, we can’t exactly turn him away now. But we have to be prepared. We’re walking into the lion’s den, it’s best we remember that.”

 

Then next day at noon the five of them waited at the corner where they had met the boy the day before. Percy wore a hood but his white hair peaked out underneath it. They waited for almost an hour before the kid showed up.

Vex tried to smile and sound lighthearted, “I thought you said noon?” Waves of unease rippled through the group as they waited for him to answer.

“These aren’t who he said you would have with you. I had to go back and ask him what he wanted to do.” The boy answered.

“And what did he say?” Tristan asked, his voice terribly rough considering he was speaking to a small boy.

He shrugged and turned around, “He said bring you to him and he will decide for himself.” And the boy started to run off.

They didn’t have too much of an issue following him, they did have long legs and the boy would look over to make sure they hadn’t fallen too far behind, but he was fast and knew the area and obviously ran these streets often.

Soon they came to a set of stairs that led down to a simple brown door beneath a large, but simple, building. The boy knocked on the door four times and then kicked it once. The door swung open after a few seconds and they followed the child in.

For a skeevy looking basement from the outside, the inside was well lit with magic lamps, people bustled around the room, there was laughter down the hall to the left. There were extraordinarily well-made chairs around large entry room and a coffee table that had been seen a lot of use but still looked like it had a lifetime and a half left to go. In another circumstance, another life, Percy may have asked where they bought it. Perhaps if everything went well.

“Follow me,” the boy waved at them and started down the hallway in front of them.

He knocked on the last door on the left. There was a moment’s pause and then it opened. “Oh hi there little fella.” In the doorway stood a large half-orc. Two large teeth—did they call them tusks?—went up over his top lip and he had a large, very childlike, smile. Then he frowned. “Oh I’m sorry bud, I don’t think you’re in the right place. This is kind of like, a grown up thing. I don’t really know how—”

“Chod, let the boy in.” A rough, Marquesian voice called from in the room.

The half-orc shrugged and stepped back to let them all in. The room had thick rugs on the floor, nice but odd art on the walls, and a beautiful desk and very comfortable looking chair. Vex leaned over to Percy and said, “Darling I think we’ve been in the wrong business. Maybe we should get into counterfeit furniture.”

“It’s nice, isn’t it?” The behind the desk was looking through paperwork on the desk. He didn’t look up at them as he signed another piece.

The boy cleared his throat and held his hand out over the desk in front of Aes Adan’s face. Aes looked up at the boy, narrowed his eyes, then grabbed a few coins from his pocket and dropped them into the boy’s hand. “Don’t spend it all in one place.” The boy rushed off and slammed the door behind him as he went. “So you are the ones claiming to be…Vox Machina?” He finally looked at them directly and Vex could tell he was not impressed.

“No, we don’t call ourselves that,” Vex said calmly.

Annik’s hand was on the hilt of his sword and Tristan was looking at Chod like he was ready to take him down at any movement. Vex wasn’t even sure Ruuva noticed the tension, however. She walked around the room, admiring different knick knacks and things around.

“Oh? Are you not Vex’ahlia? Twin sister to Vax’ildan? Wonderous archer and controller of bears?” Vex didn’t answer so he turned to Percy. “And are you not Lord Percival de Rolo? Creator of these amazing weapons I’ve heard about?” Percy glanced at Vex but didn’t answer. Aes nodded and stood up. He was almost a head taller than Percy, with long scraggly dark hair and a curved scar under his eye. “Ah. I am glad you have decided not to lie to me, I am very good at detecting lies. Your friends,” he looked at the other three, “have been looking for me for a while. I tend to avoid people looking for me. But when I heard rumor that you had popped up in the city…well I had hoped it would be all of Vox Machina.”

“We don’t travel together anymore,” Percy said cautiously.

“I see. I was hoping to do business with them.”

Percy nodded, “You could do it with us. Whatever it is you wanted to give all of us would be just as safe in our hands.”

Aes looked at him long and hard. Then to Vex. “Your brother, where is he?”

Vex felt cold. “I don’t know,” she said through clenched teeth.

“From what I hear that is not the answer Vex’ahlia would give.”

“It’s the answer I am giving.”

He hummed and then looked to Percy. “Whitestone fairs well?”

“Yes,” Percy answered as truthfully as he could, they hadn’t received much news about a small foreign city.

“Has it started snowing there yet?” Aes waited patiently for an answer that didn’t come. Then nodded. “And the half elf woman, Keylith I believe?”

“Keyleth,” Vex corrected darkly.

“Yes, yes. Where is she? The two gnomes. The handsome one and the follower of Sarenrae? The goliath? I have so much information about Vox Machina, the band of heroes and saviors of cities, and yet now you stand here with,” he looked at the other three again and pursed his lips, “less than reputable allies and none of the ones you supposedly called family.”

Wheels were turning in Vex’s mind. He knew so much about them, about their family. Some of it wasn’t totally true. Master of bears, for instance. The fact that he said gnomes and not just gnome. But other things felt off. Asking about Whitestone, saying that she would always know where he brother was, calling Scanlan the handsome one. She studied him silently while he went on, trying to find something about him, perhaps they had met before or maybe he had an inside source, something.

Aes Adan looked back to Vex. “I believe you are lying. That you are impersonating Vox Machina to gain something, perhaps to draw me out. Are you using magic? Actors who happen to look like them?” Aes held up a hand, “Actually, I don’t care.” He nodded to Chod.

Chod blinked and then asked quietly, “What does that mean?”

Aes rolled his eyes, “It means call the rest of everyone in here and kill them!” he hissed back.

Percy’s gun was out so fast she almost missed it, pointed directly at Aes Adan’s head. The man didn’t even blink. Ruuva’s sword was out as well, though she stood farther back and waited. Tristan slowly pulled his sword and a dagger, and Annik’s fingers moved at his side with shadows drifting off of them as he prepared a spell.

Vex stumbled forward and pushed Percy’s hand away and stepped between Percy and the man who started to step back. “We left too,” she sputtered out. “We left too, Scanlan,” and she dropped to her knees and pulled him into a tight hug, not bothering to wait for an answer. Instead she pressed her forehead into his small shoulder and cried.

Slowly, very slowly, he hugged her back. A tiny form in the large, empty image of a man. Of course Scanlan would be using a disguise. And of course he became a crime lord. The idea brought out a small laugh between sobs.

Chod, who had been slowly trying to grasp what was happening, suddenly leapt into action. His action being waving his arms and making sounds that reminded Percy of a very angry duck.

Scanlan suddenly pulled away and said, “Chod. Why don’t you tell Kaylie to wait outside the door and then grab some chocolate milk?”

“Are—are you sure? ‘Cause I can take care of these guys, I’m pretty good at that.”

“I’m sure. Now please, bring the girl.”

Chod frowned and looked like he wanted to say more, but he decided against it and left.

“Kaylie’s here too?” Vex asked quietly.

Percy still had a tight grip on his gun. “Is it really you, Scanlan?” His voice was tense and bordering on a growl.

The image in front of them shimmered and then disappeared entirely, leaving just a gnome. He wore purple silk and he had gold rings and bracelets. He had a few more earrings but still had the simple, small gold hoop that they had used with Vox Machina. “The one and only Scanlan Shorthalt.” He did a short, mocking bow.

Percy’s expression did not change. “Why were you looking for us?”

Vex looked at him, a warning in her eyes. She couldn’t lose Scanlan. Not again. But Scanlan answered with a quiet voice, “I thought…you were looking for me.” Vex had been one of the few to see Scanlan in his weakest moments but this was the most heartbreaking one she had seen yet. His voice was weak, almost breaking, his shoulders had a subtle slump from him trying to look more proud than he was, there were dark circles under his eyes, and he refused to make eye contact for more than a second or so.

“We were looking for a crime boss.” Percy didn’t hide the anger, what was the point?

Scanlan held his hands out, “You found one. And I’m sure I’ll want to help you, but…I need to know what happened. Where is everyone else? Why are you out here on your own? What have I missed?”

“That’s not any of your business quite frankly,” Percy snapped back.

Vex turned to Percy and touched his hand, “Percy, we’re no better than him. We ran too. In the middle of the night without even saying anything. With the book.” Percy looked away and tried not to grind his teeth. He still believed, no he _knew_ , that it was different. That he and Vex were in the right and Scanlan was in the wrong. But he also knew that technically Vex was right and he would need to be the better man once again.

Percy had always had a bit of an ego. Vex didn’t mind, but she feared that it would be a fatal flaw. She was also prepared to do everything imaginable to make sure it wouldn’t be.

Vex told her new friends to leave the room, which Tristan had some hesitation about, and when they were gone and the door shut softly behind them she told Scanlan everything. She told him about the book and Opash and how she planned to run away alone but Percy decided to come too. She told him about Tristan’s grandfather and the weird cult that surrounded Opash that she refused to get involved in (much to Tristan’s confusion). She told him about how Annik was beginning to grow on her when he wasn’t being an asshole. About how Ruuva had recently joined the gang and Vex was already impressed by her resolve, that she truly seemed to want to help the world rather than wanted to follow Vex, which made it easier to believe they weren’t fucking everything up. And Vex told them they had come to Marquet now because that was where most of Opash’s work was before he was exiled, work on Guuthal which Opash believed was going to be a key part of defeating Vecna. Which was why they had been looking for a crime lord, there were things they just didn’t have access to as strangers in the city.

And when she finished Scanlan folded his arms over his chest. “So you want my help?”

Vex felt like she was walking on a lake where the ice wasn’t thick enough and she felt the first crack under her foot. “No, no it’s nothing like that. We really had no idea it was you, we know you wanted your space, that you would…you would go back when you were ready. We didn’t—”

“Well I hope there’s another bed back at your little hideout because I am not sharing a room with that drow, she looked like she could kill me.” He smiled, “If you’ll have me on your team. After all, us runaways have to stick together.”

Vex could feel it under the surface, a million things that needed to be said that neither of them was ready for. Things they needed to talk about before they could heal. Vex knew it was a half forced and half hopeful request.

Scanlan looked at Percy again and then said quickly, “Or I can just give you some information on what you’re looking for.”

“No. You should come.” Percy’s voice was hard and he was glaring down at Scanlan, “Vex is right. We ran away too. And you obviously have some experience in the area, you have some sway, you can get us what we need. So if you really want to help and you don’t plan on fucking us all over again, you should come.”

Scanlan flinched and said, “I am sorry. I was not…I was not in a good place. But I can help you now.”

He donned the Hat of Disguise again and went to the door. He opened it and there was a young gnomish woman leaning against the wall, inspecting her fingernails with vague disinterest. “Come in,” Scanlan said in his thicker accent.

When Kaylie saw Percy and Vex she didn’t look surprised. “So it really was you guys. I told him it was after we met the first time but he didn’t think you guys would come without everyone else.” Vex blinked in surprise as it hit her. The boy in the market. It had been Kaylie, perhaps with a hat of her own.

“I’m going to be leaving with them. I was hoping—”

“That I’d keep the place from burning to the ground?”

Scanlan smiled with a soft warmth that Vex never expected to see from him. Like a father. “Yeah, exactly.”

She nodded, lips pursed and arms over her chest, like she was holding herself back from him but Vex knew. Kaylie was worried and she loved him, she just didn’t want to say it in front of them. But it was obvious Scanlan knew. Nothing needed to be said. “Alright. But not forever, you have to come back here when you’re done to take it back.” _Don’t die. Come back._

“I was born to be a crime lord, I’m not going to give it up so easily.” _I will. I promise._

He took off the hat and they hugged. Vex and Percy looked away and tried to give them a moment. And when he was done he donned the hat, took on a different appearance than Aes Adan, and Kaylie put on her own hat and her form shifted to the tall Marquesian man.

When Scanlan smiled it was almost all genuine. “Alright, let’s save the world again.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I brought back the boy

**Author's Note:**

> So uh, I have called this the evil AU a few times but I want to stress that I really don't think of it like that and I see it as a dark AU. Vex, throughout all of it, really believes what she's doing is the right thing and I think I explained it as best I could earlier, everyone believes what they are doing it the right thing. My goal isn't to make Vex evil it's about what if Vex had one moment where she wasn't so strong. And you're going to notice an increasing amount of out of character moments for her. Partly because I'm not that great at writing everyone but mostly because when you take someone as pure as Vex it's very difficult to keep them in character while doing very out of character things and I'm not good enough to make that work, so instead my goal is to have these out of character moments but by the end I want it to be very obvious why this all happened the way it did, likely way before the end. I haven't done too much planning yet.  
> This was pretty heavily influenced by a character I'm working on for the last book in my published trilogy (well, the first two are out I'm working on the third one now) only the one in my book is a side character and not from her POV so this is a fun project for me to take a storyline I love but don't get to explore and I get to do it with a character I really love rather than one I'm not too fond of.  
> Anyways, not that all that is important, I hope you guys liked this, I hope it's something you think is cool and uh, well let me know what you think and what you think would be cool to see and stuff you guys have thoughts on, or just let me know you liked it or that I could do something better. It is unedited cause I hate editing so if you find something weird that you don't get just let me know. Also!! If you like listening to music that kind of sometimes goes with what you're reading I have a Spotify account with a public playlist for this fic, my username is rowanpuck and the playlist is still called If You Turn Evil, It's Still Cool (Perc'ahlia) because I am unoriginal.


End file.
